N u g - g II n, m., a song. There are poets among the tribes, who compose songs ; these are sung and danced to by their own tribe in the firsft place, after which other tribes learn the song and dance; and so the thing itinerates from tribe to tribe throughout the country, until, from change of dialect, the very words are not understood correctly by distant blacks.
P 6 r b u g, the name of a mystic ring, in which certain cere- monies of initiation are performed ; from p 6 r, ' to drop down, to be born.'
Puntimai, ;«., a messenger, an ambassador. These men are generally decorated with the down of the swan or of the hawk on their heads, when on an embassy. They arrange the time, place, and manner of preparations for a battle or for the punishing of a supposed offender or real aggressor. They bring intelligence of the movements of hostile tribes, or the last new song and dance (cf. n u g - g u n) . When they travel at night, a fire-stick is always carried by thera as a protection against the powers of darkness, the evil spirits, of which they are in continual dread.
Puttikan, another imaginary being, like a horse, having a large mane and a tail sharp like a cutlass ; whenever he meets the blacks, they go towards him and draw up their lips to show that the tooth is knocked out * ; then he will not injure them ; but should the tooth be still there, he runs after them, and kills and eats them. He does not walk, but bounds like a kangaroo, and the noise of his leaps on the ground is as the report of a gun ; he calls out as he advances, 'Pirrolog, Pirrolog.'
T i 1 m u n, m., a small bird of the size of a thrush. It is supposed by the women to be the first maker of women ; or to be a woman transformed after death into the bird ; it runs up trees like a woodpecker. These birds are held in veneration by the women only. The bat, k o 1 u g - k o 1 u g, is held in veneration on the same ground by the men, who suppose the animal a mere transformation.
Tippakalin, Mailkun, and B i m p 6 i n, are names of the wife of K i n, q.v. She is a much more terrific being than her husband ; him the blacks do not dread, because he does not kill them ; but this female being not only carries off the natives in a large bag-net and drags them beneath the earth, but she spears the children through the temples ; she thus kill them, and no one ever sees again those whom she obtains.
Turrama, m., an instrument of war, called by Europeans a 'boomerang.' It is of a half-moon shape ; when thrown in the air it revolves on its own centre and returns, forming
- This is a proof that the black man has been duly initiated at the ceremonies of the
Bora. See s.v. Yarro. — Ed.
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