d only have a
spirit wife, never an incarnate one.

If you ask a black woman why the Kumbuy thud the earth in answer to an
initiate's wife, she will say:

'Dat one jealous.' jealousy even in the spirit world of women!

Unchaste women were punished terribly. After we went west even the
death penalty for wantonness was enforced, though at the time we did
not know it.

Should a girl be found guilty of a frailty, it being her first fault,
her brothers and nearest male relations made a ring round her, after
having bound her hands and feet, and toss her one from the other until
she is in a dazed condition and almost frightened to death.

The punishment over, she is unbound and given to her betrothed, or a
husband chosen for her.

Should a woman have been discovered to be an absolute wanton, men from
any of the clans make a ring round her, she being bound, and tossed
from one to the other, and when exhausted is unbound and left by her
relations to the men to do as they please to her--the almost inevitable
result is death. With this terror before them, it is possible the old
blacks are right who say that their women were very different in their
domestic relations in olden times.

CHAPTER VIII

THE TRAINING OF A BOY UP TO BOORAH PRELIMINARIES

At the boy manufactory, Boomayahmayahmul, the wood lizard, was the
principal worker, though Bahloo from time to time gave him assistance.

The little blacks throw their mythical origin at each other tauntingly.
A little black girl, when offended with a boy friend, says:

'Ooh, a lizard made you.'

'Wah! wah! a crow made you,' he retorts.

Up to a certain age boys are trained as are girls--charms sung over
them to make them generous, honest, good swimmers, and the rest; but
after that they are taken into the Weedegah, or bachelors' camp, and
developed on manly lines.

When he is about seven years old, his mother will paint her son up
every day for about a week with red and white colourings. After that he
would go to the Weedegah Gahreemai, bachelors' camp. He would then be
allowed to go hunting with boys and men. He would see, now when he was
out with the men, how fire was made in the olden time, almost a lost
art now when wax matches are plentiful.

No boy who had not been to a Boorah would dare to try to make fire.

The implements for fire-making are a little log about as thick as a
man's arm, of Nummaybirah wood--a rather soft white wood--and a split
flat pie