Finding the deathbed guarded, the boolee turned sharply from the camp and sped away down the road, dissolving on the poligonum flat in the distance.
Yellen gave a sigh of relief.
But now her fears were verified; Beemunny was dead.
Poor old Beemunny! How the vanities of youth cling to one; how we are 'all sisters under the skin.' She was ever so old, she was blind, her face was scarred with wrinkles, yet one of her beauties remained, and she absolutely joyed in its possession: it was her hair.

Her hair was thick and fuzzy, when combed would stand nearly straight out, which is quite unusual with the native women's hair in that part.

Beemunny one day asked one of the younger women if I had ever heard what a lot of lovers she had had in her youth, what fights there had been over her, and all because of her beautiful hair.
Poor old Beemunny! Something in my own woman nature went out to her in sympathy.

She was old, she was ugly, her husband was dead, as were all men to her.
Poor old Beemunny! Having once learnt her vanity, I never passed her without saying 'Gubbah Tekkul!' 'Beautiful hair!' at which she would beam and toss her head.
At sunrise came again the wailing; the singing of the Goohnai, or dirge, wherein are enumerated all the multiplex totems of the deceased, crooned in a wailing way, and each fresh person who comes to the camp sings this dirge again.

In olden times all would have been painted in full war paint, weapons in hand, to see the corpse.
I was given permission to go to the funeral, old Bootha was to take me.
I heard that Beemunny had died early in the night.