The Euloowayi, or long-nailed devils, are spirits which live where the sun sets. Just as the afterglow dies in the sky, they come out victim-hunting. These Euloowayi demand a tribute of young black men from the camp, to recoup their own ranks.
When this tribute has to be paid, the old men get some ten or so young ones, and march them off to a Minggah at about ten or fifteen miles from the camp. There they make them climb into the Ming-ah, to sit there all day. They must not move, not even so much as wink an eyelid. At night time they are allowed to come down, and are given some meat, which they must eat raw.
The old men from the camp go back leaving their victims with the Euloowayi, who keep the boys up the tree for some days, bringing them raw meat at night. At last they say:
'Come and try if your nails are long and strong enough. See who can best tear this bark off with them.'
They all try, and if all are equally good, the old Euloowayi say:
'You are right. How do you feel?'
'Strong,' they answer.
They are kept on the tree about a month, then taken into the bush to hunt human beings, to deceive whom they take new forms at times. A couple of blacks may be hunting—one will be after honey, another after opossums. The one after opossums will go to a tree, see an opossum, chop into the tree, seize the opossum by the tail as usual. He cannot move him. He'll seize him by the hind legs, still he cannot move him. Then he will hear a voice say, 'Leave him alone, you can't move him.'
The hunter will look down, see nothing but a rainbow at the foot of the tree. Wonderingly he'll come down, and immediately the Euloowayi, who have been in the form of the opossum in the tree and the rainbow on the ground, seize him, tear him open with their long nails, take out all his fat, stuff him up again with grass and leaves, and send him back to the camp. When he reaches there, he starts scolding every one. Probably they guess by his violent words and actions that he is a victim of the Euloowayi. If so, they are careful not to answer him; were they to do so he would drop dead. Any way, he will die that night. When the magpies and butcher-birds sing much it is a sign the Euloowayi are about.
Gineet Gineet, so called from his cry, is the bogy that black children dread. He is a black man who goes about with a goolay or net across his shoulders, into which he pops any children he can steal.