CHAPTER III SUMMARY
FROM a consideration of the Australian cosmogonic myths alone, the inference was drawn that the central and northern portions of the continent exhibited a type of mythology which was unlike the southern and eastern; and this conclusion is, on the whole, strengthened by the evidence derived from the animal and miscellaneous tales. The former class of explanatory myths appears to be much more fully evolved in the southern and eastern portions of the continent than in the central and northern; where, on the other hand, we find a high development of the peculiar type of tales which recount both the origin of the totemic ancestors by coming up out of the ground, and their wanderings and activities as instructors in ceremonial and social usages. In the central area the great bulk of all the mythology so far published is concerned with the doings of these totem ancestors, and there is a relative absence of tales relating to heroes or mythological personages which are not directly associated with limited groups of people, but are the common property of the whole tribe. Totem clans and ceremonies form an integral part of the organization and life of the southern and eastern tribes just as they do in the central area, but they do not so completely dominate the mythology. In the distribution of particular tales or incidents, in like manner, there are certain ones which belong to one or other of the two main areas, but relatively few which are common to both. Thus the distinction between the central and northern areas on the one hand,, and the southern and eastern on the other, which has been recognized on linguistic grounds, apparently finds a fair parallel in the mythology.