purpose even without any personal relic of his victim. In the Banks'
Islands, for example, he need only procure a bit of human bone or a
fragment of some lethal weapon, it may be a splinter of a club or a chip
of an arrow, which has killed somebody. This he wraps up in the proper
leaves, recites over it the appropriate charm, and plants it secretly in
the path along which his intended victim is expected to pass. The ghost
of the man who owned the bone in his life or perished by the club or the
arrow, is now lurking like a lion in the path; and if the poor fellow
strolls along it thinking no evil, the ghost will spring at him and
strike him with disease. The charm is perfectly efficient if the man
does come along the path, but clearly it misses fire if he does not. To
remedy this defect in the apparatus a sorcerer sometimes has recourse to
a portable instrument, a sort of pocket pistol, which in the Banks'
Islands is known as a ghost-shooter. It is a bamboo tube, loaded not
with powder and shot, but with a dead man's bone and other magical
ingredients, over which the necessary spell has been crooned. Armed with
this deadly weapon the sorcerer has only to step up to his unsuspecting
enemy, whip out the pocket pistol, uncork the muzzle by removing his
thumb from the orifice, and present it at the victim; the fatal
discharge follows in an instant and the man drops to the ground. The
ghost in the pistol has done his work. Sometimes, however, an accident
happens. The marksman misses his victim and hits somebody else. This
occurred, for example, not very many years ago in the island of Mota. A
man named Isvitag was waiting with his ghost-shooter to pop at his
enemy, but in his nervous excitement he let fly too soon, just as a
woman with a child on her hip stepped across the path. The shot, or
rather the ghost, hit the child point-blank, and it was his sister's
child, his own next of kin! You may imagine the distress of the
affectionate uncle at this deplorable miscarriage. To prevent
inflammation of the wound he, with great presence of mind, plunged his
pocket pistol in water, and this timely remedy proved so efficacious
that the child took no hurt.[622]
[Sidenote: Prophecy inspired by ghosts.]
Another department of Melanesian life in which ghosts figure very
prominently is prophecy. The knowledge of future events is believed to
be conveyed to the people by a ghost or spirit speaking with the voice
of a man, who is himself unconscious while he speaks. The predictions
which emanate from the prophet under these circumstances are in the
strictest sense inspired. His human personality is for the time being in
abeyance, and he is merely the mouthpiece of the powerful spirit which
has temporarily taken possession of his body and speaks with his voice.
The possession is indeed painfully manifest. His eyes glare, foam bursts
from his mouth, his limbs writhe, his whole body is convulsed. These are
the workings of the mighty spirit shaking and threatening to rend the
frail tabernacle of flesh. This form of inspiration is not clearly
distinguishable from what we call madness; indeed the natives do not
attempt to distinguish between the two things; they regard the madman
and the prophet as both alike inspired by a ghost or spirit, and a man
will sometimes pretend to be mad in order that he may get the reputation
of being a prophet. At Saa a man will speak with the voice of a powerful
man deceased, while he twists and writhes under the influence of the
ghost; he calls himself by the name of the deceased who speaks through
him, and he is so addressed by others; he will eat fire, lift enormous
weights, and foretells things to come. When the inspiration, or
insanity, is particularly violent, and the Banks' Islanders think they
have had quite enough of it, the friends of the prophet or of the madman
will sometimes catch him and hold him struggling and roaring in the
smoke of strong-smelling leaves, while they call out the names of the
dead men whose ghosts are most likely to be abroad at the time, for as
soon as the right name is mentioned the ghost departs from the man, who
then returns to his sober senses. But this method of smoking out a ghost
is not always successful.[623]
[Sidenote: Divination by means of ghosts.]
There are many methods by which ghosts and spirits are believed to make
known to men who employ them the secret things which the unassisted
human intelligence could not discover; and some of them hardly perhaps
need the intervention of a professional wizard. These methods of
divination differ very little in the various islands. In the Solomon
Islands, for instance, when an expedition has started in a fleet of
canoes, there is sometimes a hesitation whether they shall proceed, or a
doubt as to what direction they should take. Thereupon a diviner may
declare that he has felt a ghost step on board; for did not the canoe
tip over to the one side? Accordingly he asks the invisible passenger,
"Shall we go on? Shall we go to such and such a place?" If the canoe
rocks, the answer is yes; if it lies on an even keel, the answer is no.
Again, when a man is sick and his friends wish to know what ghost is
vexing or, as they say, eating him, a diviner or wizard is sent for. He
comes bringing an assistant, and the two sit down, the wizard in front
and the assistant at his back, and they hold a stick or bamboo by the
two ends. The wizard then begins to slap the end of the bamboo he holds,
calling out one after another the names of men not very long deceased,
and when he names the one who is afflicting the sick man the stick of
itself becomes violently agitated.[624] We are not informed, but we may
probably assume, that it is the ghost and not the man who really
agitates the stick. A somewhat different mode of divination was
occasionally employed at Motlav in the Banks' Islands in order to
discover a thief or other criminal. After a burial they would take a
bag, put some Tahitian chestnut and scraped banana into it, and tie it
to the end of a hollow bamboo tube about ten feet long in such a way
that the end of the tube was inserted in the mouth of the bag. Then the
bag was laid on the dead man's grave, and the diviners grasped the other
end of the bamboo. The names of the recently dead were then called over,
and while this was being done the men felt the bamboo grow heavy in
their hands, for a ghost was scrambling up from the bag into the hollow
of the bamboo. Having thus secured him they carried the imprisoned ghost
in the bamboo into the village, where the roll of the recent dead was
again called over in order to learn whose ghost had been caught in the
trap. When wrong names were mentioned, the free end of the bamboo moved
from side to side, but at the mention of the right name it revolved
briskly. Having thus ascertained whom they had to deal with, they
questioned the entrapped ghost, "Who stole so and so? Who was guilty in
such a case?" Thereupon the bamboo, moved no doubt by the ghost inside,
pointed at the culprit, if he was present, or made signs as before when
the names of the suspected evildoers were mentioned.[625]
[Sidenote: Taboo based on a fear of ghosts.]
Of the many departments of Central Melanesian life which are permeated
by a belief in ghostly power the last which I shall mention is the
institution of taboo. In Melanesia, indeed, the institution is not so
conspicuous as it used to be in Polynesia; yet even there it has been a
powerful instrument in the consolidation of the rights of private
property, and as such it deserves the attention of historians who seek
to trace the evolution of law and morality. As understood in the Banks'
Islands and the New Hebrides the word taboo (_tambu_ or _tapu_)
signifies a sacred and unapproachable character which is imposed on
certain things by the arbitrary will of a chief or other powerful man.
Somebody whose authority with the people gives him confidence to make
the announcement will declare that such and such an object may not be
touched, that such and such a place may not be approached, and that such
and such an action may not be performed under a certain penalty, which
in the last resort will be inflicted by ghostly or spiritual agency. The
object, place, or action in question becomes accordingly taboo or
sacred. Hence in these islands taboo may be defined as a prohibition
with a curse expressed or implied. The sanction or power at the back of
the taboo is not that of the man who imposes it; rather it is that of
the ghost or spirit in whose name or in reliance upon whom the taboo is
imposed. Thus in Florida a chief will forbid something to be done or
touched under a penalty; he may proclaim, for example, that any one who
violates his prohibition must pay him a hundred strings of shell money.
To a European such a proclamation seems a proof of the chief's power;
but to the native the chiefs power, in this and in everything, rests on
the persuasion that the chief has his mighty ghost at his back. The
sense of this in the particular case is indeed remote, the fear of the
chiefs anger is present and effective, but the ultimate sanction is the
power of the ghost. If a common man were to take upon himself to taboo
anything he might do so; people would imagine that he would not dare to
make such an announcement unless he knew he could enforce it; so they
would watch, and if anybody violated the taboo and fell sick afterwards,
they would conclude that the taboo was supported by a powerful ghost who
punished infractions of it. Hence the reputation and authority of the
man who imposed the taboo would rise accordingly; for it would be seen
that he had a powerful ghost at his back. Every ghost has a particular
kind of leaf for his badge; and in imposing his taboo a man will set the
leaf of his private ghost as a mark to warn trespassers of the spiritual
power with which they have to reckon; when people see a leaf stuck, it
may be, on a tree, a house, or a canoe, they do not always know whose it
is; but they do know that if they disregard the mark they have to deal
with a ghost and not with a man,[626] and the knowledge is a more
effectual check on thieving and other crimes than the dread of mere
human justice. Many a rascal fears a ghost who does not fear the face of
man.
[Sidenote: The life of the Central Melanesians deeply influenced by
their belief in the survival of the human soul after death.]
What I have said may suffice to impress you with a sense of the deep
practical influence which a belief in the survival of the human soul
after death exercises on the life and conduct of the Central Melanesian
savage. To him the belief is no mere abstract theological dogma or
speculative tenet, the occasional theme of edifying homilies and pious
meditation; it is an inbred, unquestioning, omnipresent conviction which
affects his thoughts and actions daily and at every turn; it guides his
fortunes as an individual and controls his behaviour as a member of a
community, by inculcating a respect for the rights of others and
enforcing a submission to the public authorities. With him the fear of
ghosts and spirits is a bulwark of morality and a bond of society; for
he firmly believes in their unseen presence everywhere and in the
punishments which they can inflict on wrongdoers. His whole theory of
causation differs fundamentally from ours and necessarily begets a
fundamental difference of practice. Where we see natural forces and
material substances, the Melanesian sees ghosts and spirits. A great
gulf divides his conception of the world from ours; and it may be
doubted whether education will ever enable him to pass the gulf and to
think and act like us. The products of an evolution which has extended
over many ages cannot be forced like mushrooms in a summer day; it is
vain to pluck the fruit of the tree of knowledge before it is ripe.
[Footnote 590: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 130-132.]
[Footnote 591: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 132 _sq._; C. M.
Woodford, _A Naturalist among the Head-hunters_ (London, 1890), pp.
26-28.]
[Footnote 592: G. Turner, LL.D., _Samoa a Hundred Years Ago and long
before_ (London, 1884), pp. 318 _sq._ Yams are the principal fruits
cultivated by the Tannese, who bestow a great deal of labour on the
plantation and keep them in fine order. See G. Turner, _op. cit._ pp.
317 _sq._]
[Footnote 593: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 133 _sq._]
[Footnote 594: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, p. 134.]
[Footnote 595: R. H. Codrington, _op. cit._ pp. 135 _sq._]
[Footnote 596: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 137 _sq._]
[Footnote 597: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, p. 138.]
[Footnote 598: R. H. Codrington, _op. cit._ pp. 138 _sq._]
[Footnote 599: R. H. Codrington, _op. cit._ p. 139.]
[Footnote 600: "Native Stories of Santa Cruz and Reef Islands,"
translated by the Rev. W. O'Ferrall, _Journal of the Anthropological
Institute_, xxxiv. (1904) p. 223.]
[Footnote 601: "Native Stories from Santa Cruz and Reef Islands," _op.
cit._ p. 224.]
[Footnote 602: "Native Stories from Santa Cruz and Reef Islands," _op.
cit._ p. 225.]
[Footnote 603: Compare _The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings_, i.
269 _sqq._]
[Footnote 604: G. Turner, _Samoa a Hundred Years Ago and long before_
(London, 1884), p. 326.]
[Footnote 605: G. Turner, _op. cit._ p. 334.]
[Footnote 606: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 145-148.]
[Footnote 607: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 175 _sq._]
[Footnote 608: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 176 _sq._]
[Footnote 609: R. H. Codrington, _op. cit._ pp. 177 _sq._]
[Footnote 610: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 178-180.]
[Footnote 611: R. H. Codrington, _op. cit._ p. 191.]
[Footnote 612: R. H. Codrington, _op. cit._ p. 194.]
[Footnote 613: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 194-196.]
[Footnote 614: R. H. Codrington, _op. cit._ p. 196.]
[Footnote 615: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 208 _sq._ As to
sickness supposed to be caused by trespass on the premises of a ghost
see further _id._, pp. 194, 195, 218.]
[Footnote 616: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, p. 184.]
[Footnote 617: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, p. 200.]
[Footnote 618: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 200, 201. The
spirit whom the Florida wizard appeals to for good or bad weather is
called a _vigona_; and the natives believe it to be always the ghost of
a dead man. But it seems very doubtful whether this opinion is strictly
correct. See R. H. Codrington, _op cit._ pp. 124, 134.]
[Footnote 619: R. H. Codrington, _op. cit._ p. 201. The Santa Cruz name
for such a ghost is _duka_ (_ibid._ p. 139).]
[Footnote 620: Above, p. 375.]
[Footnote 621: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 202-204.]
[Footnote 622: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 205 _sq._]
[Footnote 623: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 209 _sq._,
218-220.]
[Footnote 624: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 210.]
[Footnote 625: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 211 _sq._]
[Footnote 626: R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, pp. 215 _sq._]
LECTURE XVIII
THE BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY AMONG THE NATIVES OF NORTHERN AND EASTERN
MELANESIA
[Sidenote: Northern Melanesia. Material culture of the North
Melanesians.]
In the last lecture I concluded my account of the belief in immortality
and the worship of the dead among the natives of Central Melanesia.
To-day we pass to what may be called Northern Melanesia, by which is to
be understood the great archipelago lying to the north-east of New
Guinea. It comprises the two large islands of New Britain and New
Ireland, now called New Pomerania and New Mecklenburg, with the much
smaller Duke of York Island lying between them, and the chain of New
Hanover and the Admiralty Islands stretching away westward from the
north-western extremity of New Ireland. The whole of the archipelago,
together with the adjoining island of Bougainville in the Solomon
Islands, is now under German rule. The people belong to the same stock
and speak the same language as the natives of Central and Southern
Melanesia, and their level of culture is approximately the same. They
live in settled villages and subsist chiefly by the cultivation of the
ground, raising crops of taro, yams, bananas, sugar-cane, and so forth.
Most of the agricultural labour is performed by the women, who plant,
weed the ground, and carry the produce to the villages. The ground is,
or rather used to be, dug by sharp-pointed sticks. The men hunt
cassowaries, wallabies, and wild pigs, and they catch fish by both nets
and traps. Women and children take part in the fishing and many of them
become very expert in spearing fish. Among the few domestic animals
which they keep are pigs, dogs, and fowls. The villages are generally
situated in the midst of a dense forest; but on the coast the natives
build their houses not far from the beach as a precaution against the
attacks of the forest tribes, of whom they stand greatly in fear. A New
Britain village generally consists of a number of small communities or
families, each of which dwells in a separate enclosure. The houses are
very small and badly built, oblong in shape and very low. Between the
separate hamlets which together compose a village lie stretches of
virgin forest, through which run irregular and often muddy foot-tracks,
scooped out here and there into mud-holes where the pigs love to wallow
during the heat of the tropical day. As the people of any one district
used generally to be at war with their neighbours, it was necessary that
they should live together for the sake of mutual protection.[627]
[Sidenote: Commercial habits of the North Melanesians. Their
backwardness in other respects.]
Nevertheless, in spite of their limited intercourse with surrounding
villages, the natives of the New Britain or the Bismarck Archipelago
were essentially a trading people. They made extensive use of shell
money and fully recognised the value of any imported articles as mediums
of exchange or currency. Markets were held on certain days at fixed
places, where the forest people brought their yams, taro, bananas and so
forth and exchanged them for fish, tobacco, and other articles with the
natives of the coast. They also went on long trading expeditions to
procure canoes, cuscus teeth, pigs, slaves, and so forth, which on their
return they generally sold at a considerable profit. The shell which
they used as money is the _Nassa immersa_ or _Nassa calosa_, found on
the north coast of New Britain. The shells were perforated and threaded
on strips of cane, which were then joined together in coils of fifty to
two hundred fathoms.[628] The rights of private property were fully
recognised. All lands belonged to certain families, and husband and wife
had each the exclusive right to his or her goods and chattels. But while
in certain directions the people had made some progress, in others they
remained very backward. Pottery and the metals were unknown; no metal or
specimen of metal-work has been found in the archipelago; on the other
hand the natives made much use of stone implements, especially adzes and
clubs. In war they never used bows and arrows.[629] They had no system
of government, unless that name may be given to the power wielded by the
secret societies and by chiefs, who exercised a certain degree of
influence principally by reason of the reputation which they enjoyed as
sorcerers and magicians. They were not elected nor did they necessarily
inherit their office; they simply claimed to possess magical powers, and
if they succeeded in convincing the people of the justice of their
claim, their authority was recognised. Wealth also contributed to
establish their position in the esteem of the public.[630]
[Sidenote: The Rev. George Brown on the Melanesians.]
With regard to the religious ideas and customs of the natives we are not
fully informed, but so far as these have been described they appear to
agree closely with those of their kinsfolk in Central Melanesia. The
first European to settle in the archipelago was the veteran missionary,
the Rev. George Brown, D.D., who resided in the islands from 1875 to
1880 and has revisited them on several occasions since; he reduced the
language to writing for the first time,[631] and is one of our best
authorities on the people. In what follows I shall make use of his
valuable testimony along with that of more recent observers.
[Sidenote: North Melanesian theory of the soul. Fear of ghosts,
especially the ghosts of persons who have been killed and eaten.]
The natives of the archipelago believe that every person is animated by
a soul, which survives his death and may afterwards influence the
survivors for good or evil. Their word for soul is _nio_ or _niono_,
meaning a shadow. The root is _nio_, which by the addition of personal
suffixes becomes _niong_ "my soul or shadow," _niom_ "your soul or
shadow," _niono_ "his soul or shadow." They think that the soul is like
the man himself, and that it always stays inside of his body, except
when it goes out on a ramble during sleep or a faint. A man who is very
sleepy may say, "My soul wants to go away." They believe, however, that
it departs for ever at death; hence when a man is sick, his friends will
offer prayers to prevent its departure. There is only one kind of soul,
but it can appear in many shapes and enter into animals, such as rats,
lizards, birds, and so on. It can hear, see, and speak, and present
itself in the form of a wraith or apparition to people at the moment of
or soon after death. On being asked why he thought that the soul does
not perish with the body, a native said, "Because it is different; it is
not of the same nature at all." They believe that the souls of the dead
occasionally visit the living and are seen by them, and that they haunt
houses and burial-places. They are very much afraid of the ghosts and do
all they can to drive or frighten them away. Above all, being cannibals,
they stand in great fear of the ghosts of the people whom they have
killed and eaten. The man who is cutting up a human body takes care to
tie a bandage over his mouth and nose during the operation of carving in
order to prevent the enraged soul of the victim from entering into his
body by these apertures; and for a similar reason the doors of the
houses are shut while the cannibal feast is going on inside. And to keep
the victim's ghost quiet while his body is being devoured, a cut from a
joint is very considerately placed on a tree outside of the house, so
that he may eat of his own flesh and be satisfied. At the conclusion of
the banquet, the people shout, brandish spears, beat the bushes, blow
horns, beat drums, and make all kinds of noises for the purpose of
chasing the ghost or ghosts of the murdered and eaten men away from the
village. But while they send away the souls, they keep the skulls and
jawbones of the victims; as many as thirty-five jawbones have been seen
hanging in a single house in New Ireland. As for the skulls, they are,
or rather were placed on the branch of a dead tree and so preserved on
the beach or near the house of the man who had taken them.[632]
[Sidenote: Offerings to the souls of the dead.]
With regard to the death of their friends they deem it very important to
obtain the bodies and bury them. They offer food to the souls of their
departed kinsfolk for a long time after death, until all the funeral
feasts are over; but they do not hold annual festivals in honour of dead
ancestors. The food offered to the dead is laid every day on a small
platform in a tree; but the natives draw a distinction between offerings
to the soul of a man who died a natural death and offerings to the soul
of a man who was killed in a fight; for whereas they place the former on
a living tree, they deposit the latter on a dead tree. Moreover, they
lay money, weapons, and property, often indeed the whole wealth of the
family, near the corpse of their friend, in order that the soul of the
deceased may carry off the souls of these valuables to the spirit land.
But when the body is carried away to be buried, most of the property is
removed by its owners for their own use. However, the relations will
sometimes detach a few shells from the coils of shell money and a few
beads from a necklace and drop them in a fire for the behoof of the
ghost. But when the deceased was a chief or other person of importance,
some of his property would be buried with him. And before burial his
body would be propped up on a special chair in front of his house,
adorned with necklaces, wreaths of flowers and feathers, and gaudy with
war-paint. In one hand would be placed a large cooked yam, and in the
other a spear, while a club would be put on his shoulder. The yam was to
stay the pangs of hunger on his long journey, and the weapons were to
enable him to fight the foes who might resist his entrance into the
spirit land. In the Duke of York Island the corpse was usually disposed
of by being sunk in a deep part of the lagoon; but sometimes it was
buried in the house and a fire kept burning on the spot.[633]
[Sidenote: Burial customs in New Ireland and New Britain. Preservation
of the skull.]