During this
performance the lads showed no sign of pain, although their sufferings
must have been very severe. Further ceremonies then took place, in
which the women played a part too degrading to be here set down.
That night a feast was held, with dancing, in honour of the morning's
ceremonies. The night was warm and the moon shone with a wonderful
brilliancy, casting deep shadows upon the earth. In the distance rose a
pillar of sparks and fire, which marked the place where the performers
were preparing for the corroboree, a name given to their dancing by
these savages, and presently 200 men and 60 boys in nudity came from
among the forest trees. Each dancer was provided with a bunch of leaves
fastened above the knee, which, as they stamped in unison, made a loud
switching noise. These natives were painted from shoulder to hip, with
five or six stripes rising from the breast, their faces streaked with
white perpendicular lines, making it appear as the dancing of dead
men's bones. For some time the dancers continued to stamp to and fro,
and then, assembling at a fire that burned close by, they
simultaneously sat down. Other dancers then took their places, dressed
in fur cloaks, and wearing white and yellow feathers in their hair,
their black visages rendered hideous by fish-bones stuck through the
cartilage of the nose above their thick lips.
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