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The others became as furious as he was; they all burst with rage and rushed away roaring in six different directions, and ever since have only returned as formless wind to be heard but never seen. So savagely the Mayrah howled round the Doolungaiyah's camp that he burrowed into the sand to escape, and his tribe have burrowed ever since. Three of the winds are masculine and three feminine.
Yarragerh and Douran Doura are the most honoured winds as being the surest rain-bringers. In some of the blacks' songs Mayrah is sung of as the mother of Yarragerh, the spring, or as a woman kissed into life by Yarragerh putting such warmth into her that she blows the winter away.
They can but moan through them, or tear them in rage for the lovers they have stolen, whom they can only meet twice a year at the great corroboree of the winds, when they all come together, heard but never seen; for Mayrah, the winds, are invisible, as were the Mayrah, the tribe who in bursting gave them birth.
Then they know that Mayrah has really blown the winter away, for the birds are beginning to pair and build their nests. So they open their eyes and come out on the green earth again. And when the black fellows hear the curreequinquins singing "Goore, goore," they know that they can go out and find iguanas again, and find them fatter than when they went away with the coming of winter.
They all stay in their winter homes until Mayrah blows the winter away. Mayrah first blows up a thunderstorm. When the iguanas hear the thunder, they know the spring is not far off, so they begin making a passage to go out again, but they do not leave their winter home until the Curreequinquin, or butcher birds sing all day almost without ceasing "Goore, goore, goore, goore."
You hear people say they could have 'burst with rage, but it is left to a black's legend to tell of a whole tribe bursting with rage, and so originating the winds. There was once an invisible tribe called Mayrah. These people, men and women, though they talked and hunted with them, could never be seen by the other tribes, to whom were only visible their accoutrements for hunting.
One of these Mayrah men chummed with one of the Doolungaiyah tribe; he was a splendid mate, a great hunter, and all that was desirable, but for his invisibility. The Doolungaiyah longed to see him, and began to worry him on the subject until at last the Mayrah became enraged, went to his tribe, and told them of the curiosity of the other tribes as to their bodily forms.
They would hear a woman's voice speak to them, see perhaps a goolay in mid-air and hear from it an invisible baby's cry; they would know then a Mayrah woman was there. Or a man would speak to them. Looking up they would see a belt with weapons in it, a forehead band too, perhaps, but no waist nor forehead, a water-vessel invisibly held: a man was there, an invisible Mayrah.
They know they shall meet them again later on, when they are grown big. Then as Mayrah softly blows, the flowers one by one open, and the bees come out again to gather honey. Every bird wears his gayest plumage and sings his sweetest song to attract a mate, and in pairs they go to build their nests.
And still Mayrah softly blows until the land is one of plenty; then Yhi the sun chases her back whence she came, and the flowers droop and the birds sing only in the early morning. For Yhi rules in the land until the storms are over and have cooled him, and winter takes his place to be blown away again by Mayrah the loved of all, and the bringer of plenty.
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