Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: October 18, 2025
They camped in the scrub near the old camp of the tribe who had started the Boorah. That night in the camp the Gayandi was heard again, another ceremony was at hand. The next day the women at the big camp made a big fire, a little distance away. When this fire was nearly burnt out they covered it thickly with Budtha, Dheal, and Coolabah leaves to make a great smoke.
After having given all necessary information, the Gooyeanawannah would return to his tribe; the wirreenun to whom he had given the Doolooboorah, or message-stick, would send it on by the messenger of his tribe, and so with others, until all were summoned, each tribe letting it be known that a Boorah summons had been received by sounding the Gayandi, which would carry its own tale to those in the camp.
These bull roarers sound curiously uncanny I did not wonder the uninitiated accepted the spirit theory as to their origin. The bush of Australia is a good background for superstition; there is such a non-natural air about its Nature, as if it has been sketched in roughly by a Beardsley-like artist. The function of the Gayandi is to inspire awe, and it fulfils it. Byamee himself made the first.
All the while, closer and still closer, comes the sound of the Gayandi, as the men call the Gurraymi, or bull roarer. At length the two old wirreenuns come back to the camp and the noise ceases, to recur sometimes during the night, when I expect, did any one search for them, the old wirreenuns would be found missing from the camp.
As each boy received his stone another loud chorus of 'Wah! wah! wah! went up from that crowd, making the scrub ring with the sound. Some of those, of whose tribe it was the custom it is not invariably so now had a front tooth knocked off; this done a wirreenun chanted to the boy, who had been blindfolded and almost deafened by the whirring of Gayandi. One chant was as follows:
As louder grew the chant an answer came from the scrub, the voice of Gayandi; shaking with fear the boys fell to the ground, to all appearance lifeless. Then the old men went forward, each with a stone knife in hand. Stooping over the two boys they opened veins in each, out flowed the blood, and the other men all raised a death cry. The boys were lifeless.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking