CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
The following pages are intended as a contribution to the study of the manners, customs, beliefs, and legends of the Aborigines of Australia. The area of my observation is mainly limited to the region occupied by the Euahlayi tribe of north-western New South Wales, who for twenty years were my neighbours on the Narran River. I have been acquainted since childhood with the natives, first in southern South Australia; next on my father's station on the Darling River, where I was saved by a native girl, when my sisters were drowned while bathing. I was intimate with the dispositions of the blacks, and was on friendly terms with them, before I began a regular attempt to inquire into their folk-lore and customary laws, at my husband's station on the Narran, due north of the Barwon River, the great affluent of the Murray River.
My tribe is a neighbour of that mentioned by Mr. Howitt as the 'Wollaroi, ' 'Yualloroi,' or 'Yualaroi.'[1] I spell the tribal name 'Euahlayi'; the accent is on the second syllable—'You-ahl-ayi'; and the name is derived from the tribal word for the negative: Euahl, or Youal, 'No,' as in the case of the Kamilaroi (Kamil, 'No'), and many other tribes.
Mr. Howitt regards these tribes as on the limits of what he calls the 'Four Sub-Class' system. The people, that is to say, have not only the division into two 'phratries,' or 'exogamous moieties,' intermarrying, but also the four 'Matrimonial Classes' further regulating marriage. These classes bear the Kamilaroi names, of unknown
