WILGIDI'S TOTEM

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 129, 2 June 1928, Page 15

WILGIDI'S TOTEM

Every' Australian native who dies has a personal "familiar," some kind of animal*.bird, or thing, which scientists call his totem. Quite recently Wilgidi, a little girl about seven years old, died. Her totem was-the nringari, a little reptile. ■"Wilgidi- liad never killed a mingari, and now, that she is dead no one will try any more .to catch mingari and sell them to the passengers on the trains, for'they were Wilgidi's totem, and a totem must not bo touched. So this harmless little creature, with spikes sticking up all over its body (the mountain devil is its common name), will be ablp to live and eat tho tiny black ants which^ are its only food and are a pest ,to white people. ■ A friend of the little Wilgidi says:— brought me many little mingari, for she knew I should never hurt her totem. We playqd with them a little, and then let them . go. Wilgidi is not resting in her grave according to native ideas, but is crying to her mother to come to her, and her mother hears the cry and cannot eat or Bleep because the child wants her. It will not be long before her mother conies. I 3oiow she is mourning, though she is many miles from her child's grave. And there is no one to comfort that poor mother, for her man has another wife with whom he travels to and fro, hnd she did not like Wilgidi, ana is glad-the little child is dead."

'. Uncle Stork: "How are'you getting bn at school, Dicky?" Dicky Bird: "Oh, fine, uncle. My teacher puts a big ;kiss on every sum I do." ..••-;