Bugu-doo-ga-da was an old woman. She lived alone with dingo dogs, of which there were four hundred. Bugu-doo-ga-da and the dogs ate human flesh, and she obtained this food for everyone by cunning.
She was leaving her camp with two small dogs. Having met a group of twenty or thirty Daens walking down the stream, she said to them:
“I can show you where there is a lot of game.”
When they asked where it was, she answered:
- Up there on the top of the mountain range. If you go there and get your nullah clubs ready, I and my dogs will drive the game at you.
The Daens stood where she showed them, and Bugu-du-ga-da with two dogs meanwhile went to the camp. She quietly repeated: “Birri goo-goo.” Hearing these words, all the dogs jumped out, suddenly surrounded the Daens and bit them to death. Then they and Bugu-du-ga-da dragged the bodies to their camp and cooked them. This food was enough for the old woman and the dogs for some time, and when the food supplies ran out, the same story was repeated.
The Daens had lost so many of their comrades that they decided to find out what had happened to them.
Gradually they began to suspect Bugu-doo-ga-doo. The Daens agreed that the next detachment of hunters that would go to the stream would split up and part of it would hide and see what would happen.
And so the observers saw how the old woman approached their companions, talked to them, and then left with her two dogs. They saw their comrades positioned on the crest of the ridge, their clubs ready. Then they heard the old woman's quiet call: "Birri goo-goo" - and immediately hundreds of dingoes jumped out of the bushes, surrounding the Daen. The dingoes simultaneously rushed at the dark-skinned people, tore them with their teeth and killed every single one of them. And then the old woman and the dogs dragged the bodies of their comrades to their camp.
The observers returned to their camp and reported what they had seen. Then all the tribes living around decided to immediately take revenge on the old woman. They armed themselves, and one party set out to trap the dingoes and Bugu-doo-ga-doo. And so, when the dogs, as usual, jumped out of the bushes to surround the detachment, more than two hundred warriors jumped out and killed all the dingoes and the old woman.
The old woman fell dead, but when the Daens were leaving, they heard her cry: “Bugu-du-ga-da!” Then they returned and crushed the bones of her legs. But when they moved away, they again heard the cry: “Boo-doo-ga-da!” They came back again, broke all her bones, but she still screamed: “Boo-doo-ga-da!”
Then one person stayed near her to see where the sound was coming from. Suddenly the old woman’s heart began to move, and with a cry of “Boo-doo-ga-da,” a small bird flew out of it.
Since then, this small grayish bird has been running along the rocks and shouting: “Boo-doo-ga-da.” She hides all day and flies out only at night. She looks like Vida the mockingbird. The Daen call her the rain bird: when someone steals her eggs, she continuously shouts: “Boo-doo-ga-da” - until it rains. When there is a drought in the country, the Daen look for this little bird and, having found it, chase it until it screams loudly: “Bugu-doo-ga-da, Bugu-doo-ga-da.” Hearing her cry, the Daens expect rain.
When the little bird flew out of the old woman's heart, all the dead dingoes were turned into various poisonous snakes, and the two small dogs became small harmless Deya-minya snakes - after all, these dogs never bit the daens, as dingoes did. At the top of the ridge where Bugu-doo-ga-da and her dingoes killed the Daen, lie piles of white stones believed to be the petrified bones of the dead.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru