"The stars are all very afraid of the sun. If he finds them out in the day-time he gets very angry and burns them all. So they never come out till he has gone down under the earth. Sometimes, though, a little star will come and see if he has gone, but most of them wait in their country till he is really down."
Some of the black children in some parts of the far North call hailstones rainbow's eggs, and worms baby rainbows, because they have noticed sometimes after a rainbow has been seen hailstones have fallen. After these have melted, or, as they would probably say, burrowed into the ground, numbers of worms have appeared. This is why they call worms baby rainbows.
The black people are nearly always very much frightened at eclipses either of the sun or moon. They have two chief ways of accounting for them. Some tribes will say that a hostile tribe has hidden in or near the luminary and held bark in front of it, whilst others put the whole trouble down to an evil spirit which has got in front. Whatever their belief as to the cause of an eclipse may be, when one takes place they will all throw spears at it in the hope that the hostile tribe or evil spirit will find things too uncomfortable to remain.
There are three ways of accounting for shooting stars. Some believe them to be the spirits of the dead. Some think that they are firesticks thrown down by some evil spirit who has his home in the sky, whilst others would say that a medicine man flying through the air has let his firestick fall.
CHAPTER XII MORE STORIES TOLD TO CHILDREN
Each part of Australia has its own stories as to the origin of the world and man. It would be impossible to tell them all, especially when one remembers that no two tribes believe exactly the same. There is a more or less general belief in a Creator who made the sun, moon, and stars, the earth, trees, rocks, birds, animals, and man, everything, in fact, except women. Their origin is left more or less unaccounted for. No Creator could have bothered himself to make such unimportant things as women. Different tribes have different names for the Creator. In some parts he is called Baiame or Byamee, in others Pundjel or Punjil, in others Daramulun. Here is a story about Daramulun which the men of the Yuin tribe tell.
Ever so many moons ago Daramulun lived on the earth with his mother. The earth in those days was hard and bare and there were no men and women upon it, only reptiles, birds, and animals. So Daramulun made trees. Soon afterwards men and women appeared, but whether Daramulun made them or whether they just came up out of the earth we have not been told. One day a thrush caused a great flood, and all the people were destroyed except a few who managed to crawl out and take refuge on Mount Dromedary. From these have come the Yuin tribe of to-day. Daramulun, after the flood was over, called them all together, and told them how they were to live and catch and cook their food, and gave them their laws. At the same time he gave the medicine men power to use magic. Then he went away to the sky country. When a man dies Daramulun meets his spirit and takes care of it.
Now listen to a story about Punjil which the old Victorian blacks have frequently told:—