| Share page | Visit Us On FB |
|
|
||
|
236 CURIOSITIES OF MUSIC. |
||
|
|
||
|
" While the men are thus engaged, the gentler sex are busy arranging themselves in a long line, and in a sitting posture, with rugs made of possum skins, wound round their legs, and a small stick called ' mulla mulla' in each hand. A fire is lit in front of them, and tended by one of the old charmers. As the men are ready, they seat themselves, cross-legged, like tailors, and in regular serried file, at the opposite side of the fire to the women, while one of the medicine-men takes up his position at the top of the mound, to watch the rising of the moon which is the signal for • corrob-boree.'"
All is now still; nothing disturbs the silence, save the occasional jabber of a woman or child, and even that, after a few minutes, is hushed. The blaze of the fire throws a fitful light along the batallion-like front of the black phalanx, and the hideous faces, daubed with paint and smeared with grease, show out at such a moment to anything but advantage. As soon as the old gentleman who has been " taking the lunar " announces the advent of that planet, which seems to exercise as great an influence over the actions of these people, as over many of those amongst ourselves, the " corrobboree" commences.
" The women beat the little sticks together,* keeping time to a peculiar monotonous air, and
alternately appairing and disappearing, by the dim flicker of the firelight.
* Here we see one of the earliest traits of primitive music. The uaa •f a plain, rhythmic accompaniment, without tune. |
||
|
|
||