Page:The Aborigines of Victoria and Riverina.djvu/26

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very expert in finding the trees in which these grubs are; in fact, they never err; yet to a casual observer, or even one with some acuteness, there is not the slightest difference in the appearance of a tree containing numberless grubs and one without any. These grubs are eaten with great relish, either cooked or raw.

During winter they are not in the least choice as to their food; anything having life, no matter how repulsive to European notions it may be, is most acceptable. At that time frogs are deemed good, snakes^[1] most toothsome, and the abominable fetid wild dog is esteemed a luxury of the highest order.

CHAPTER III.

OF THE MARRIAGE RELATIONS AND POLYGAMY; LACK OF CHASTITY AND ITS CAUSES; OF WIDOWS AND THEIR DISPOSAL; CHILDREN AND THEIR TRAINING; OF THE RED OCHRE, WITH WHICH THEY PAINT THEMSELVES, AND HOW OBTAINED; THE WATER-YIELDING ROOT, WHEN AND HOW UTILISED; OF DRESS AND ORNAMENT; PRACTICES ON ATTAINING THE AGE OF PUBERTY, AND PRIOR THERETO; PHYSICAL CAPACITY.

Their marriage relations are of the most primitive and simple character, the noun love being entirely absent from their vocabulary. Nothing in the shape of courting or company-keeping is practised by the prospective bridegroom

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1. It may seem an anachronism to speak of snakes as an article of food in the winter time, but it is not so, as the aborigine with his savage cunning knows when and where to catch the reptile napping during the season of hybernation.