THE DIEYERIE.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume III, Issue 236, 6 January 1875, Page 2

THE DIEYERIE.

(From the ZVanwa Tlerald.) It has been truly said that one-half of the world does not know how the other half lives ; and there is no more engaging subject of research than the manners and customs of different branches of the human family. The Government of South Australia have recently published a very interesting little book, of which we have received a copy, describing a queer set of people who inhabit the desert six hundred and thirty miles North of Adelaide ; in the very middle, that is, of the island-con-tinent of New Holland. They are called the Dieyerie, an unusually euphonious name for Australia, where, as a rule, the native names are not too graceful. For instance, we learn that the four tribes whose country borders on that of the Dieyerie, are called respectively the Yandrawontha, Yarrawaurka, Auminie, and Wonkaooroo The Dieyerie are not very nice people to live among, their only virtues being hospitality, reverence to old age, and. love for their children and parents. The author of the book before us says A more treaoheous race I do not believe exists. They imbibe treachery in infancy, and practice it until death, and have no sense of wrong in it. Gratitude is to them an unknown quality. No matter how kind or generous you are to them, you cannot assure yourself of their affection. Even amongst themselves, for a mere trifle, they would take the life of their dearest friend, and consequently are in constant dread of each other, while their enmity to the white man is only kept in abeyance by fear. They will smile and laugh in your face, and the next moment, if opportunity offers,, kill you without remorse. They seem to take a delight in lying, especially if they think it will please you. Should you ask them any question, be prepared for a falsehood as a matter of course. They not only lie to the white man, but to each other, and do not appear to see any wrong in it. Although very much attached to such of their children as they choose to rear, they habitually destroy about thirty per Cent of them by burying them alive in the sand, or dashing their brains out with a club ; indeed murder, infanticide and bloodshed generally, appear to be mere everyday amusements with them. Like most savages they are very superstitious, without being susceptible of any religious feeling. Some of their traditions are curious and ingenious ; here is their idea of the Creation :—

In the beginning, say the Dieyerie, the Mooramoora (Good Spirit) made a number of small black lizards (these are still to be met with under dry bark), and being pleased with them he promised they should have power over all other creeping things. The Mooramoora then divided their feet into toes and fingers, and placing his fore-finger on the centre of the face created a nose, and so in like manner afterwards eyes, mouth, and ears. The Spirit then placed one of them in a standing position, which it could not, however, retain, whereupon the Diely cut off the tail, and the lizard walked erect. They were then made male and female, so as to perpetuate the race, and leave a tribe to dispute their ancestry with Darwin’s monkeys. Men, women, or children do not vary in the slightest degree in this account of their creation. Perhaps a Colenso will be found some day to dispute the accuracy of the Dieyerie version of Genesis, but at present their unanimity of belief puts civilised races to shame. The subdivision of the tribe into families is

said to have been brought about in the following manner : — After the creation, as previously related, fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, and othersof the closest of kin intermarried promiscuously, until the evil effects of their alliances becoming manifest, a council of the chiefs was assembled to consider in what way they might be averted, the result of their deliberations being a petition to the Mooramoora, in answer to which he ordered that the tribe should be divided into two branches, and distinguished one from the other by different names, after objects animate and inanimate, such as dogs, mice, emu, rain, iguana, and so forth, the members of apy such branch not to intermarry, but with permission for one branch to mingle with another. Thus the son of a dog might not marry the daughter of a dog, but either might form an alliance with a mouse, an emu, a rat, or other family. Although inhabiting a region which is singularly' poor in animal or vegetable life, and barely subsisting on snakes, rats, roots, and seeds, the Dieyerie are not cannibals in the usual sense of the word. They are, however, anthropophagous out of pure love and affection to their dearest relations ; for they substitute cannibalism for interment or cremation. The following description of their funeral rites is not appetising, but it is so very remarkable that we give it intact.

When the old man stops beating the coonya, the men and women commence crying, and the body' is removed from the heads of the bearers and lowered into the grave, into which a native (not related to the deceased) steps, and proceeds to cut off all the fat adhering to the muscles of the face, thighs, arms, and stomach, and passes it round to be swallowed. The reason assigned for this horrible practice being that thus the nearest relatives may forget the departed, and not be continually crying. The order in which they partake of their dead relatives is this : — The mother eats of her children. The children eat of their mother. Brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law eat of each other. Uncles, aunts, nephews, nieces, grandchildren, grandfathers, and grandmothers eat of each other. But the father docs not eat of his offspring, or the offspring of the sire. The Dieyerie method of assuaging grief is certainly original. When a wealthy English, person dies, the relatives are anxious to learn how the departed will “ cut up those who get no legacy are themselves “ cut up ” about it. But both these phrases are merely metaphorical; we never heard of a bereaved lady being induced to leave off crying through receiving a fat slice of underdone grandmother. A perusal of this curious and interesting little volume confirms, if anything were necessary to confirm, the conviction that there is no state of existence so utterly miserable and void of enjoyment of every sort, as the condition of savages, who yet have intelligence enough to possess superstitions. Wild beasts are a thousand times happier than they are, while the life of the simple, indolent, inhabitants of Tahiti, Pitcairn, and many of the fertile Pacific islands, is a perfect paradise compared "With theirs. From the moment when the Dieyerie mother decides not to murder her child, to that when the said child grown old and dead, is devoured by bis relatives, he suffers incessantly. Tortures of the most horrible kind are inflicted on him, in obedience to the laws of the tribe, at various stages of his existence ; he is drenched in blood, speared, mutilated, and tormented in order to make him brave and enduring ; if he wants it to rain, he plunges a sharp flint into his veins : if he wants to find food, he pricks bis flesh with a splinter ; if iguanas are not plentiful, sharpened bones are run through his ears ; if he meets with an accident or fails in any undertaking, his friends beat him till he bleeds ; if he is only suspected of an injury, if he gets the best of the bargain, if he commits the smallest breach of the thousand and one minute regulations laid down by the Dieyerie superstitions ; he knows he will either have to undergo excruciating pain, or be inexorably put to death. It seems wonderful that any human being can care to live on such terms at all. but that whole races of mankind should continue for endless ages to support such an existence, and jealously to protect it from innovation or improvement, is one of those most marvellous dispensations of Providence which neither priest nor philosopher has yet explained.