recommends you, if you are troubled with pimples, to watch for a
falling star, and then instantly, while the star is still shooting
from the sky, to wipe the pimples with a cloth or anything that
comes to hand. Just as the star falls from the sky, so the pimples
will fall from your body; only you must be very careful not to wipe
them with your bare hand, or the pimples will be transferred to it.

Further, homoeopathic and in general sympathetic magic plays a great
part in the measures taken by the rude hunter or fisherman to secure
an abundant supply of food. On the principle that like produces
like, many things are done by him and his friends in deliberate
imitation of the result which he seeks to attain; and, on the other
hand, many things are scrupulously avoided because they bear some
more or less fanciful resemblance to others which would really be
disastrous.

Nowhere is the theory of sympathetic magic more systematically
carried into practice for the maintenance of the food supply than in
the barren regions of Central Australia. Here the tribes are divided
into a number of totem clans, each of which is charged with the duty
of multiplying their totem for the good of the community by means of
magical ceremonies. Most of the totems are edible animals and
plants, and the general result supposed to be accomplished by these
ceremonies is that of supplying the tribe with food and other
necessaries. Often the rites consist of an imitation of the effect
which the people desire to produce; in other words, their magic is
homoeopathic or imitative. Thus among the Warramunga the headman of
the white cockatoo totem seeks to multiply white cockatoos by
holding an effigy of the bird and mimicking its harsh cry. Among the
Arunta the men of the witchetty grub totem perform ceremonies for