there are no indications of the speaker, and it is as difficult to
translate as a modern play would be if all the speakers' names and the
stage directions were omitted. Judging by the phraseology I take it to
be a late version of the ancient story, probably not more than a century
old. The older poems contain archaic words whose meaning is
unintelligible to the natives of these days, for the language is being
steadily impoverished as the older generation is giving place to men
taught in the mission schools.
The Tuka Heresy
[Pageheader: THE IMMORTALITY HERESY]
In 1876 the Fijians had all nominally accepted Christianity. In every
village throughout the group services were held regularly by native
teachers of the Wesleyan Mission; the heathen temples had been
demolished; and all customs likely to keep alive the old heathen cults
had been sternly discountenanced. Even the old men conformed outwardly
to the new faith, and it was hoped that, as they died out, the old
beliefs would perish with them. But it was not to be expected that they
had really abandoned all belief in the religion of their fathers.
Towards the end of 1885 strange rumours were carried to the coast by
native travellers from the mountains. A prophet had arisen, who was
passing through the villages crying, "Leave all, and follow me." He had
gathered around him a band of disciples on whom he was bestowing the
boon of immortality (_tuka_), to fit them to consort with their
ancestors who were shortly to return from the other world bringing the
millennium with them. The Commissioner of the Province, the late Mr.
Walter Carew, found the rumour to be substantially true. A man named
Ndungumoi, of the village of Ndrauni-ivi in the Rakiraki district, who
had been deported in 1878 to one of the Lau islands for stirring up
sedition, but had been allowed to return home about three years before,
had announced that he had had a revelation from the ancestor-gods. He
said that the foreigners had deported him to Tonga and still believed
him to be there. They had tried to drown him, he said, by throwing him
overboard with the ship's anchor tied about his neck, but, being _vunde_
(charmed), he had swum safely ashore with his body, leaving his spirit
behind to deceive the foreigners. Taking the title of Na-vosa-vakandua
(He who speaks but once), the native title for the Chief Justice of the
Colony, he appointed two lieutenants, who went through the mountain
villages enrolling disciples and teaching them a sort of drill
compounded of the evolutions of the Armed Native Constabulary and native
dances. The prophet carried about with him a bottle of water, called
Wai-ni-tuka (Water of Immortality), which conferred immortality upon him
who drank of it. People paid for the boon at a rate varying from ten
shillings' to two pounds' worth of property, and so remunerative was
this part of his business, that at a feast held at Valelembo he could
afford to present no fewer than four hundred whales' teeth, a king's
ransom according to the Fijian standard. Fortunately for the Government,
the prophet was no ascetic. He had enrolled a bevy of the best-looking
girls in the district to be his handmaidens, by persuading them that his
holy water conferred not only immortality, but perpetual virginity, and
that they therefore ran no risk of the usual consequences of
concubinage. It was through the parents of these "Immortality Maidens"
that information first reached the Government officers.
Ndungumoi's teachings were an ingenious compound of Christianity with
the cult of Ndengei. Recognizing probably that the Mission had too firm
a hold to be boldly challenged, he declared that when Nathirikaumoli and
Nakausambaria, the twins who made war against Ndengei, had sailed away
after their defeat, they went to the land of the white men, who wrote a
book about them, which is the Bible; only, being unable to pronounce
their Fijian names correctly they called them Jehovah and Jesus. His,
therefore, was the newer revelation. There was some controversy among
the faithful whether Ndengei was God or Satan. Most of them inclined to
the latter belief, because Satan, like Ndengei, was a serpent. They
named various places round Kauvandra Roma (Rome), Ijipita (Egypt),
Kolosa (Colossians), etc., and they said that if a man were bold enough
to penetrate to the recesses of the great cavern he might see the flames
of hell.
[Pageheader: THE ARREST OF THE PROPHET]
The prophet had more practical concerns than the discussion of problems
in theology. The twin gods, he said, were about to revisit Fiji,
bringing all the dead ancestors in their train, to share the ancient
tribal lands with their descendants: the missionaries, the traders, and
the Government would be driven into the sea, and every one of the
faithful would be rewarded with shops full of calico and tinned salmon.
Those who believed that he was sent before to prepare the way would be
rewarded with immortality, but the unbelievers would perish with the
foreigners. The white men, he said, were fully aware of what was coming,
as was shown by the officers of men-of-war who, when questioned as to
why they squinted through glass instruments, looked disconcerted, and
said evasively that they were measuring the reefs, whereas in fact they
were looking for the coming of the divine twins. In the meantime the
faithful were to drill like soldiers, and the women to minister to them.
They used a travesty of English words of command, and pass-words such as
"Lilifai poliseni oliva ka virimbaita,"[56] which is not sense in any
language.
Temples were built secretly at Valelembo and other places, wherein,
behind the curtain, the god might be heard to descend with a low
whistling sound. A white pig, a rarity in Fiji, and probably a symbol
for the white men, was being fattened against the day when it was to be
slaughtered as a sacrifice to the ancestors.
The prophet had fixed the day; the feasts were all prepared; threats
about what was to happen to church and state were being freely
exchanged, when the prophet was arrested. He then besought his guards
not to send him to Suva, and so defeat all the glorious miracles he was
about to work for the redemption of the race. Unless the twin gods
reappeared on earth the power of Ndengei, which is the Old Serpent,
would continue in the ascendant, for the twins were they of whom it was
foretold that they should bruise the head of the serpent. He was a
sooty-skinned, hairy little man of middle age, expansive enough with the
native warders in Suva gaol, but reticent when questioned about his
mission. He was deported to Rotuma, where he is still living, and the
outbreak was stamped out for the time.
In 1892 the heresy broke out afresh. One of his lieutenants, who had
been allowed to remain in the district, began to receive letters from
him. He would stand in the forest with a bayonet, and the magic letter
fluttered down from the sky and impaled itself on the point. This was
the more remarkable since Ndungumoi could not write. Holy water was
again distributed, there was more drilling, and the end of British rule
was again foretold. This time the Government decided to let the light
and air into Ndrauni-ivi, the fount of superstition; the people, lepers
and all, were deported in a body to Kandavu, and the very foundations of
the houses were rased to the ground.
These false prophets were not all self-deceived, nor were they wholly
deceivers. They were of that strange compound of hysterical credulity
and shrewd common-sense that is found only among the hereditary priests
of Fiji. They knew what strings to play upon in the native character.
The people are arrogant and conservative; they secretly despise
foreigners for their ignorance of ceremonial, while conforming to their
orders through timidity; their nature craves for the histrionic
excitement and the ceremonial proper to traffic with unseen powers. They
chafe secretly at the ordered regularity imposed upon them; at the
inexorable punctuality of the tax-collector, at the slow process of the
courts in redressing their grievances, at the laws which forbid them to
seize with a strong hand the property they covet. It would have been no
disgrace to them to yield allegiance to a conqueror, but the white men
never conquered them, and therefore the tribute which they pay annually
in the form of taxes is an ever-recurring dishonour. They pant for
change--for the coming of a time when the heroic stories that they have
heard from their fathers shall be realized, and their chiefs be again
lords paramount over their own lands. They have forgotten the curse of
war, the horror of the night attack, the tortures, the clubbings, the
ovens, the carrying into captivity, to which half at least of the tribes
would again be subject if their millennium came; for all the gifts which
the Empire has bestowed upon its coloured subjects, the _Pax Britannica_
is the last to be appreciated. Good government? They would welcome the
worst anarchy so it were their own and not the foreigner's!
[Pageheader: A HEATHEN REVOLT]
Upon all the jangling strings Ndungumoi harped, half believing the while
in the mission he professed. The Fijians secretly hated the foreigners
and coveted their goods; the foreigners should be swept away, leaving
their goods behind them. They found the Mission services tame; they
should dabble in the black art as often as they pleased; they loved the
excitement of conspiracy, and they admired the Old Testament; if they
believed in him they might hatch plots against the Government with
biblical sanction. Left to themselves the Tuka superstitions would have
resulted in bloodshed, if not in grave political danger. To the white
settlers in the outlying districts the natives are in the proportion of
many hundreds to one, and these must infallibly have fallen victims to
Ndungumoi's demand for blood-sacrifice. The outbreak would probably have
been confined to the island of Vitilevu, and the Government could have
counted on nearly one-half of the group to aid in suppressing it; but as
in the case of Hauhauism among the Maoris, which the Tuka resembled, the
military operations would have been protracted and costly.
The Revolt at Seankanka (_Seaqaqa_)
The outbreak in the Mathuata province in 1895, which had no political
importance, is interesting from the fact that the rebels at once
returned to heathen worship and to cannibalism, as if there had not been
a break of more than twenty years. The district of Seankanka includes a
number of inland villages whose people scarcely ever visit the
sea-coast. Split up into little communities of three or four houses,
they have been as completely cut off from the influence of the Mission
and the Government as if they were in another country. It may indeed be
doubted whether heathen practices of some kind were not carried on
continuously, although the people were nominally _lotu_. They were
naturally a peaceable folk who only asked to be left alone, and the
coast people had long been irritating them by putting upon them more
than their share of the communal and tax work of the district.
On June 11, 1895, the Governor received a letter from the Roko Tui
Mathuata announcing that on the last day of May a native constable sent
to serve a summons at the inland village of Thalalevu had been attacked
and beaten by the inhabitants, who had subsequently taken the villages
of Nathereyanga and Ndelaiviti without bloodshed. The Governor, Sir
John Thurston, sailed that night for Mathuata with a small force of
armed constabulary, and found that the rebels had followed up their
success by burning the village of Saivou, killing two of its
inhabitants, named Sakiusa and Samisoni, whose bodies were afterwards
found dismembered and prepared for cooking. The rebels had retired to an
old hill fortress called Thaumuremure, where they were strongly
entrenched. On the march inland the besiegers had to pass the grave of
the late Buli Seankanka in the village of Nathereyanga, and there they
interrupted some of the rebels, who had carefully weeded the grave, and
were in the act of presenting kava to the spirit of the dead chief to
implore his aid. The siege of Thaumuremure will not loom large in
history. The garrison numbered at the most one hundred persons; they had
no arms but their spears, while the besiegers carried Martini-Henry
rifles. But the garrison bravely blew their conch-shells and danced the
death-dance till the last. It was all over in a few minutes. Nine men
were shot dead, and the rest took to their heels, to surrender a few
days later, while the Government force could boast but three
spear-wounds. Nkaranivalu, the arch-rebel, and the two old heathen
priests, who had eaten the arms and the legs of the two victims of the
outbreak, were carried to Suva to expiate their crime. The people of the
scattered villages were collected into one large village under the eye
of their chief, and the district was at rest.
The outbreak is only interesting in that it shows how the Fijians
confuse Christianity with the Government, and cannot throw off the one
without repudiating the other; and how cannibalism was a religious rite
and not the mere gratification of a depraved taste.
The Mbaki, or Nanga Rites
[Pageheader: THE RITES OF THE FIRST FRUITS]
We have now to consider a cult which is remarkable in more than one
respect--in its contrast to the religious system of the Fijians, its
resemblance to certain Australian and Melanesian rites, and in the
sidelights which it seems to throw upon the origin of ancient monuments
in Europe.[57] Fijian mythology is essentially tribal; the Mbaki took no
cognizance of tribal divisions. It was rather a secret religious society
bound together by the common link of initiation. The rite of initiation
is a curious echo of the Engwura ceremony of the Arunta tribe in Central
Australia as described by Messrs. Spencer and Gillen. The Nanga, the
open-air temple in which the Mbaki was celebrated, has more than a
slight resemblance to the alignments at Carnac in Brittany and Merivale
on Dartmoor.
The Nanga was the "bed" of the Ancestors, that is, the spot where their
descendants might hold communion with them; the Mbaki were the rites
celebrated in the Nanga, whether of initiating the youths, or of
presenting the first-fruits, or of recovering the sick, or of winning
charms against wounds in battle. The cult was confined to a
comparatively small area, a bare third of the island of Vitilevu.
Outside this area it was unknown, and even among the tribe that built
and used the Nanga there were many who knew nothing of the cult beyond
the fact that a certain spot near their village might not be visited
without exciting the displeasure of the gods, although members of tribes
that worshipped other gods, and were frequently at war with them,
resorted to the Nanga, which they were not permitted to approach. Even
when the two tribes were at war those of the enemy that were initiated
were safe in attending the rites, provided that they could make their
way to the Nanga unobserved.
The Nangas are now in ruin. There is a large and very perfect one at
Narokorokoyawa, several in Navosa (Western Tholo), and three on the
south coast between Serua and the Singatoka river. On the western coast
there are said to be two, one in Vitongo and the other in Momi. I have
visited several whose structure was so identical that one description
will serve for all. The Nanga is a rough parallelogram formed of flat
stones embedded endwise in the earth, about 100 feet long by 50 feet
broad, and lying east and west, though the orientation is not exact. The
upright stones forming the walls are from 18 inches to 3 feet in height,
but as they do not always touch they may be described as "alignments"
rather than walls. At the east end are two pyramidal heaps of stones
with square sloping sides and flat tops, 5 feet high and 4 feet by 6
feet on the top. The narrow passage between them is the main entrance to
the enclosure. Two similar pyramids placed about the middle of the
enclosure divide it roughly into two equal parts, with a narrow passage
connecting the two. The western portion is the Nanga-tambu-tambu (or
Holy of Holies); the eastern the Loma ni Nanga (or Middle Nanga). In the
Nangas on the south coast the two truncated pyramids near the entrance
are wanting. At the middle of the west end there is another entrance,
and there are gaps in the alignments every six or eight feet to permit
people to leave the enclosure informally during the celebration of the
rites. Beyond the west end of the Nanga near Vunaniu the ground rose,
and on the slope were two old graves upon which were found the decayed
remains of two "Tower" muskets. It is possible that chiefs were buried
near the "Holy of Holies" of all the Nangas in order that their Shades,
who haunted the graves, when summoned to the Nanga by their living
descendants, should not have far to come.
[Pageheader: HOW THE RITES ORIGINATED]
Attention was first called to the Mbaki cult by the Rev. Lorimer Fison,
of the Wesleyan Mission, who, though he did not visit any Nanga, wrote
an account of the rites in the charming style that marks all his
writings.[58] He overcame the natives' reluctance to reveal these dread
secrets by a ruse. While he was describing the Australian Bora rites to
one of the _Vunilolo Matua_ of the Nanga a woman passed, and, lowering
his voice, he whispered, "Hush! the women must not hear these things!"
Covering his mouth with his hand the old native exclaimed, "Truly, sir,
you are a Lewe ni Nanga. I will tell you all about it." Mr. Adolph Joske
was probably the first European to see and describe the great Nanga at
Nerokorokoyawa, and he has added much to our knowledge of the
rites[59]. The two accounts vary in detail, perhaps because Mr. Fison
drew some of his information from Nemani Ndreu, the Raisevu, who seems
to have supplemented his ignorance of the Mbaki with excerpts from his
own Kalou-rere cult, and from the rich stores of his imagination.
The tribes that used the Nanga were the Nuyamalo, Nuyaloa, Vatusila,
Mbatiwai and Mdavutukia. All these tribes have spread east and south
from a place of origin in the western mountain district. They are of
Melanesian type, and have fewer traces of Polynesian admixture than the
coast tribes. The Mbaki, while its Nanga-temple bears a superficial
likeness to the Polynesian Marae, has a very strong resemblance to
Melanesian institutions; its dissonance with the Fijian religious system
at once suggests that there must be some tradition of its introduction
from over-sea. For this we have not far to look, for the tradition is
green in the memory of every initiate.
"Long ago two little old men, called Veisina and Rukuruku, drifted
across the Great Ocean from the westward, and passing through the Yasawa
Islands, they beached their canoe upon the little island of Yakuilau,
which lies by the coast of Nandi. Veisina, who landed first, fell into a
deep sleep, and slept till the coming of Rukuruku. From the spot where
Veisina lay sprang _thanga_ (turmeric), and from Rukuruku's footsteps
sprang the _lauthi_ (candle-nut--_Aleurites triloba_), and therefore the
followers of Veisina smear themselves with turmeric, and the followers
of Rukuruku with the black ash of the candle-nut, when they go to the
Nanga.
"The two old men took counsel, saying, 'Let us go to the chief of
Vitongo and ask him to divide his men between us that we may teach them
the Mbaki.' And when they made their request the chief granted it, and
gave them a piece of flat land on which to build their Nanga. There they
built it and called the place Tumba-levu. The descendants of men to whom
these two little black-skinned old men taught the mysteries of the Nanga
are they which practise it to this day. When they left their home and
travelled eastward they carried the mysteries with them. The Veisina do
not know what the Rukuruku do in the Nanga, nor do the Rukuruku know the
mysteries of the Veisina."
Here we have the earliest tradition of missionary enterprise in the
Pacific. I do not doubt that the two sooty-skinned little men were
castaways driven eastward by one of those strong westerly gales that
have been known to last for three weeks at a time. By Fijian custom the
lives of all castaways were forfeit, but the pretence to supernatural
powers would have saved men full of the religious rites of their
Melanesian home, and would have assured them a hearing. The Wainimala
tribes can name six generations since they settled in their present
home, and therefore the introduction of the Nanga cannot have been less
than two centuries ago. During that time it has overspread one-third of
the large island.
The following account of the rites is gathered from inquiries that I
have made of old men who accompanied me to the Ndavotukia Nangas,
supplemented by the full accounts written by Messrs. Fison and Joske.
The Veisina and Rukuruku sects used the same Nanga, but were absolutely
forbidden to reveal their mysteries to one another on pain of madness or
death. In Wainimala they seem to have held their respective festivals in
alternate years. But a few of the youths of each sect were initiated in
the mysteries of both, in token, perhaps, of the common origin of their
institutions. Mr. Joske says that no Nanga was used twice for an
initiation ceremony, but I found no support for this statement among the
Ndavotukia, whose Nanga was said, and certainly appeared, to have been
used for generations.
[Pageheader: THE PROCESSION]
Each "Lodge" comprised three degrees: (1) The _Vere Matua_, all old men
who acted as priests of the order; (2) the _Vunilolo_, the grown men;
and the _Vilavou_ (_lit._, "New Year's men"), the youths who were
novices. The great annual festival was the initiation of these youths,
who were thus admitted to man's estate, and brought into communion with
the ancestral spirits who controlled the destinies of their descendants.
The word _Vila_ is the inland synonym for Mbaki, which, with the
distributive affix _ya_ (ya-mbaki) is the coast word for "year." The
_Vilavou_, or New year ceremony of initiation, was an annual festival,
held in October-November, when the _ndrala_-tree (_Erythrina_) was in
flower. The flowering of the _ndrala_ marked the season for
yam-planting; the same seasons were observed by the Hawaiians and
Tahitians as the New Year. The rites of the Veisina differed slightly
from those of the Rukuruku, but as they were more tame and formal I will
give precedence to the Rukuruku.
Preparation for the _Vilavou_ began months before the appointed time by
putting all kinds of food and property under a tabu. On the occasion of
the last ceremony a number of pigs had been dedicated by cutting off
their tails and turning them loose in the vicinity of the Nanga. _Masi_
was beaten, clubs and spears were carved, paint was prepared for the
bodies of the worshippers, and a vast quantity of yams was planted. As
the _Vere_ of Ndavotukia expressed it, "If any man concealed any of his
property, designing not to give it, he was smitten with madness." The
same fate awaited any that killed one of the tailless pigs, or dared to
dig up any plant that grew near the Nanga. Invitations were sent to the
members of other Nangas, who were called the _Ndre_, and they brought
lavish contributions of property.
On the day appointed the _Vere_ and the _Vunilolo_ went first to the
Nanga to present the feast and make other preparations, while in the
village novices were having their heads shaved with a shark's tooth, and
being swathed in coils of masi. A procession was then formed. An old
_Vere_ went first, carrying a carved staff with a socket bored in its
upper end. Blowing upon this as on a flute, he sounded a shrill whistle,
and the boys followed in single file, carefully treading in his
footsteps. As they approached the Nanga they heard the weird chant of
the _Vunilolo_, which was supposed to imitate the sound of the surf
breaking on a distant reef. The boys flung down their weapons outside
the sacred enclosure, and with the help of the _Vunilolo_ divested
themselves of the huge swathing of _masi_, each lad revolving slowly on
his axis while another gathered in the slack, like unwinding a reel of
cotton. It being now evening, the property was stored in a temporary
shelter, and the ceremony for the day was over. The ovens were opened,
and all feasted together far into the night. For four successive days
this ritual was repeated, until the storehouse was full to bursting.
Thus were the novices made acceptable to the ancestral spirits.
On the fifth day an immense feast was prepared, and the boys were so
weighted with the cloth wound about their bodies that they could
scarcely walk. They followed the _Vere_ piping on his staff as before,
but as they approached the Nanga they listened in vain for the welcoming
chant. The enclosure seemed silent and deserted, but from the woods
broke forth shrill parrot calls, and a weird booming sound, which they
presently came to know as the note of a bamboo trumpet immersed in
water. The old _Vere_ led them slowly forward to the eastern gate of the
Nanga, and bade them kneel and crawl after him on all fours. Here a
dreadful sight appalled them. Right across the entrance lay the naked
body of a dead man, smeared with black paint from head to foot, with his
entrails protruding. Above him, stretched stiff, with his head upon one
pyramid and his feet on the other, lay another body, and under this
hideous arch, over this revolting threshold they were made to crawl.
Within the enclosure their hearts turned to water, for the dead men lay
in rows, smeared with blood and entrails, and over every body they had
to crawl. At the further end sat the chief _Vere_, regarding them with a
stony glare, and before him they were made to halt in line. Suddenly he
burst out with a great yell; the dead men started up, and ran to wash
off the blood and filth in the river hard by. They are the _Vere_ and a
few of the _Vunilolo_, playing the part of the dead Ancestors with the
aid of the blood and entrails of the pigs now baking in the ovens.
[Pageheader: THE INITIATION]
The ancient priest now relaxes the ferocity of his mien, and displays an
activity remarkable for a person of his years. Capering up and down, he
chants in shrill tones: "Why is my enclosure empty? Whither have its
inmates gone? Have they fled to Tumbalevu (the deep sea)? Have they fled
to Tongalevu?" Presently he was answered by a deep-toned chant, and the
_Vunilolo_, washed, oiled and garlanded, return with rhythmic step, each
carrying a club and a root of kava. When all are seated in the Nanga
four of the _Vere_ come in, the first carrying a piece of roast yam, the
second a piece of pork, the third a shell of kava, and the fourth a
napkin of native cloth. The first three put their offering, which is
carefully wrapped against contact with the fingers, to the mouths of
each of the _Vilavou_ in turn, who nibble the food, sip the kava, and
allow the napkin-bearer to wipe his mouth. Then one of the old _Vere_
admonishes them solemnly against revealing any of the mysteries to the
uninitiated, or infringing any of the tabus of the Nanga, or being
niggardly in contributing their property, for the penalty attached to
all these grievous sins is insanity and death.
The _Vunilolo_ now brought in food, and towards evening the _Mundu_, a
great pig dedicated years before and allowed to run wild in the sacred
precincts, was dragged in and presented to the boys. Feasting was
continued for several days, during which the boys did not leave the
Nanga, except to obey the calls of nature. By the sacrament of food and
water, too sacred even for the elders' hands to touch, they have become
_Vilavou_: their Ancestors had deigned to receive them as members of the
Nanga.
A few days after this it was the turn of the women, who had thus far
been rigidly excluded, to come to the Nanga. The usual dress of the
women of these tribes was a _liku_--narrow enough, truly, but still
sufficient for decency. But for this occasion they were dressed in a
series of such fringes as would satisfy the most puritanical if they did
not begin too late and end too early. The fringes were tied one over
another from the waist to just below the breast, so as to clothe the
trunk in a neat thatch, and, seeing the postures the women had to
assume, it was a pity that a thatch starting at the waist should not
have been carried downwards instead of in the other direction. In this
fantastic garb, with hair dyed black, the women proceeded to the Nanga
with baskets of food. At the entrance they dropped on their hands and
knees, and crawled into the enclosure in single file, the men sitting on
either side of a narrow lane left for the procession, and crying,
"_Lovo ulu! Lovo ulu!_" (Keep your heads down!) During this performance
it was strictly forbidden for the women to gaze about them, or to look
behind them, on pain of insanity. The lane was interrupted with little
mounds of freshly-turned earth, and over these the women had to crawl.
It was in topping these mounds that a better arrangement of the fringes
suggested itself. In the inner chancel of the Nanga the _Vere_ were
chanting a song called the _Vaya_. The chief _Vere_ dipped his hands in
a bowl of water, and prayed to the Ancestors to bless the women with
ample families. This is called the _Vuluvulu_ (hand-washing), and as the
_Vuluvulu_ is the ordinary form of release from a tabu, it is possible
that it is intended to absolve the women from the usual consequences of
entering a place forbidden to them. As to what happened after this, the
native accounts are in conflict. Mr. Joske's informants declared that
women only entered the Nanga to bring food, and that the rites were
orderly and inoffensive; Mr. Fison says that when the women emerged from
the enclosure, "the men rushed upon them, and an indescribable scene
ensued. The men and women addressed one another in the filthiest
language ...," and that from this moment until the close of the
ceremonies "very great licence prevailed." Mr. Walter Carew was assured
that in Wainimala the men rushed upon the women while they were in the
Nanga, and that any woman laid hold of was the lawful prize of her
captor. Among the Ndavotukia I had no difficulty in obtaining an account
of the ritual until I came to this point, but here all my informants
broke off with a self-conscious giggle, and said that they knew no more.
One told me frankly that they "did things that they were ashamed to
think about in these enlightened days, and, when pressed upon the point,
wrote down for me a song of gross indecency connected with the tattooing
of women. A native of Mbau, who lived for some years near the Nanga,
assured me that the visit of the women to the Nanga resulted in
temporary promiscuity; all tabus were defied, and relations who could
not speak to one another by customary law committed incest. This would
account for the mystery that is thrown about the rite even now. The
festival was a propitiatory sacrifice to the Ancestors to bless their
descendants with increase, and the temporary abrogation of all human
laws that interfered with freedom between the sexes had a logical place
in such a sacrifice.
[Illustration: Serua, an island chief village in the _Mbaki_ country.]
[Pageheader: FEEDING THE SACRED PIGS]
On finally leaving the Nanga the property was carried to the village,
together with two candlewood saplings, which were set up in the village
with appropriate songs, and the property was piled between them. Those
who were not members of the Order had to keep fast within doors, for if
they inadvertently caught sight of the worshippers they would have been
smitten with insanity. The invited visitors, who were in hiding near the
village, were now summoned by parties of the Order, who went out
chanting a song to find them. These they followed to the village square,
where they deposited enormous quantities of property by the saplings.
The feasting and licence continued for several days. On the last day the
_Vere_ shared out the property, taking the best care of their own
interests, and a number of the pigs were shorn of their tails and turned
out near the Nanga to serve for a future celebration. It was an act of
piety to feed these pigs, to which the sacrificer calls the attention of
the Ancestors in words such as these: "Remember me, O ye our chiefs, who
lie buried. I am feeding this pig of yours." To kill one was an
inconceivable sacrilege. One of these great brutes was living within a
year of my visit to the Nanga. It met its death at the hands of an
irreligious half-caste, whose continued sanity after this sacrilegious
deed was attributed to his foreign parentage.
The ceremony ended with the _Sisili_ (or Bath). All the men went in
company to the river, and washed off every trace of the black paint. The
_Vilavou_ were then drawn up before the _Vere_ on the river bank to
listen to a long discourse upon the new position they had assumed. They
were admonished to defer to their elders, to obey the customary law of
the tribe, and to keep the secrets of the Nanga on pain of the sure
vengeance of the Ancestors. Especially were they to avoid eating eels
and freshwater fish and all the best kinds of food. These must be
presented to the elders, for their food, until they had attained a
higher rank in the Order, must be wild yams and food that is held in
less esteem.
Minor Rites of the Nanga
As the Nanga is the earthly dwelling-place of the Ancestral spirits, it
is not necessary to seek the intervention of a _Vere_ in order to invoke
them as in the case of the Fijian tribal deities, who can only be
consulted through the priest. A member of the Nanga could approach the
Ancestors at any time by depositing an offering on the wall with proper
invocations. For many years after the people had abandoned heathenism
the native mission teachers used to keep a sharp look-out for footprints
leading in the direction of the Nanga. Two years after the conversion of
the Wainimala people a visitor to the Nanga found property and food and
the carcasses of pigs in a state of putrefaction, showing that sacrifice
was still being made. The Nanga that I last visited had not been used
for twenty-eight years. At the eastern end I found the _Vere's_
whistling staff, just where he had planted it in the earth. Moss-grown
and fretted with decay, it still emits a shrill whistle when I blow upon
it. All about the enclosure candle-nut trees had sprung up from the nuts
that had been thrown aside, and about the walls were strewn a number of
the curious funnel-shaped cooking-pots that were only used during the
Nanga celebrations.
The _Sevu_ (First-fruits) of the yam harvest were always piled in the
Nanga before the yams were dug, and allowed to rot there. From these
decayed offerings numerous yam-vines were seen sprouting among the
undergrowth. From this custom the Nanga is generally spoken of as the
Mbaki, which, as I have said, also gives its name to the Fijian
year--ya-mbaki.
Before going on the war-path warriors used to repair to the Nanga to be
made _vunde_ (invulnerable). The rites appear to have been similar to
those of the Kalou-rere.
[Pageheader: CIRCUMCISION]
But next in importance to the _Vilavou_ celebration was the rite of
circumcision, which Mr. Fison says was practised as a propitiation to
recover a chief from sickness. My inquiries did not confirm this. I was
assured, on the contrary, that while offerings were certainly made in
the Nanga for the recovery of the sick, every youth was circumcised as a
matter of routine, and that the rite was in no way connected with
sacrifice for the sick. But, although Mr. Fison may have been wrong in
his application of the ceremony, his description of the rite itself is
undoubtedly correct. He says: "On the day appointed, the son of a sick
chief is circumcised, and with him a number of other lads who have
agreed to take advantage of the occasion. Their foreskins, stuck in the
cleft of a split reed, are taken to the Nanga and presented to the chief
priest, who, holding the reed in his hand, offers them to the ancestral
gods, and prays for the sick man's recovery. Then follows a great feast,
which ushers in a period of indescribable revelry. All distinctions of
property are for the time being suspended. Men and women array
themselves in all manner of fantastic garbs, address one another in the
most indecent phrases, and practise unmentionable abominations openly in
the public square of the town. The nearest relationships--even that of
own brother and sister--seem to be no bar to the general licence, the
extent of which may be indicated by the expressive phrase of an old
Nandi chief,[60] who said, 'While it lasts we are just like the pigs.'
This feasting and frolic may be kept up for several days, after which
the ordinary restrictions recur once more. The rights of property are
again respected, and abandoned revellers settle down into steady-going
married couples, and brothers and sisters may not so much as speak to
one another. Nowhere in Fiji, so far as I am aware, excepting in the
Nanga country, are these extravagances connected with the rite of
circumcision."
The Priesthood
The priesthood was no exception to the Fijian rule that all skilled
trades must be hereditary. But inasmuch as any man who showed a natural
aptitude for carpentry or haircutting or the exorcism of evil spirits
might win a _clientele_ as a canoe-builder, a barber, or a doctor, so a
clever rogue who could shake well and make a lucky forecast of public
events might pretend to inspiration by a god, and obtain a grudging
recognition from the chiefs. In practice this seldom occurred, because
the recognized deities were amply furnished with a priesthood who
brooked no interference from an amateur, and to overcome their
opposition and the cold suspicion of the chiefs demanded a very rare
combination of assurance and cunning.
It is doubtful whether the high chiefs believed in the inspiration of
the priests, though it suited their policy to appear to do so. There was
rather an understanding between the two orders, not the less cordial
that it was unexpressed. The priests depended for subsistence upon the
offerings made to the god, and a priest who delivered oracles
unfavourable to the chief's policy saw his temple falling into decay and
his larder empty. On the other hand, so enormous was the influence of
the oracle upon the common people that the chief had the best reason for
keeping the priests in good humour. Both knew that neither could stand
firm without the support of the other. A chief with whom the gods were
angry enjoyed but a waning authority; a priest whose god the chief did
not think worth propitiating fell into disrepute and was soon superseded
by another who could shake as well and more wisely. Such relations
between the powers spiritual and temporal are not unknown in other
latitudes.
Williams relates that the Thakaundrove chief presented a large offering
to the gods on the morrow of a warlike expedition. Among the gods
invoked was Kanusimana, but in the subsequent division of the feast the
priest of that deity was put off with one wretched pudding instead of
the turtle he had expected. That night the god visited him, and foretold
defeat as a punishment for the slight, and the tidings were carried to
the king, who immediately countermanded the expedition, knowing that the
depressing effect of the news upon the spirit of his warriors would
bring defeat. In a similar case, however, matters took a different turn.
"Who are you?" asked the chief angrily. "Who is your god? If you make a
stir I will eat you."
[Pageheader: A HEATHEN REFORMATION]
A more organized resistance to sacerdotal pretensions was seen in the
"Reformation" in the Rewa province. A few years before the arrival of
the missionaries the chiefs found it necessary in their own interests to
disestablish the whole priestly caste, which, as they said, had fallen
into the hands of "low-born persons of ill repute," or, in more
intelligible language, which had begun to assume the _imperium in
imperio_ that has provoked Reformations in another hemisphere. They
repudiated the entire priesthood publicly, and announced that members of
the ruling family had received inspiration. The sacerdotal clan
immediately fell into their proper rank in society--a very humble
one--but the arrival of the missionaries deprived the new state-made
priesthood of a fair trial.
The priests were not always the tools of the chiefs; sometimes they were
the mouthpiece of the people's discontent at some unpopular exercise of
authority. "The famine is eating us up because you gave the large canoe
to Tonga instead of to Mbau." "This hurricane was sent to punish us for
your refusal to give the princess to the Lord of Rewa."
The priests of one god were generally, but not always, confined to one
family. They owed their consideration to their office rather than to
their rank, which was generally humble. They ranked according to the
importance of the god to whom they ministered. When the chieftancy and
the priesthood were united in the same person, both were of low order.
The titular spiritual chief (Roko Tui) was not a priest, although divine
honours were paid to him, for the act of inspiration appeared to be
thought derogatory to the dignity of a high chief. The priesthood could
not be dispensed with, because the gods could not be approached except
through the medium of a priest, who could only be inspired in the temple
of his god except on rare occasions, such as a campaign in a distant
island, when the oracle must be consulted in a private house if at all.
"One who intends to consult the oracle dresses and oils himself, and,
accompanied by a few others, goes to the priest, who, we will suppose,
has been previously informed of the intended visit, and is lying near
the sacred corner, getting ready his response. When the party enters he
rises and sits so that his back is near to the white cloth by which the
god visits him, while the others occupy the opposite side of the
_mbure_. The principal person presents a whale's tooth, states the
purpose of the visit, and expresses a hope that the god will regard him
with favour. Sometimes there is placed before the priest a dish of
scented oil with which he anoints himself and then receives the tooth,
regarding it with deep and serious attention. Unbroken silence follows.
The priest becomes absorbed in thought, and all eyes watch him with
unblinking steadiness. In a few minutes he trembles; slight distortions
are seen in his face, and twitching movements in his limbs. These
increase to a violent muscular action, which spreads until the whole
frame is violently convulsed, and the man shivers as with a strong ague
fit. In some instances this is accompanied with murmurs and sobs, the
veins are greatly enlarged, and circulation of the blood quickened. The
priest is now possessed by his god, and all his words and actions are
considered as being no longer his own, but those of the deity who has
entered into him. Shrill cries of '_Koi au! Koi au!_' (It is I! It is
I!) fill the air, and the god is supposed thus to notify his approach.
While giving the answer the priest's eyes stand out and roll as in a
frenzy; his voice is unnatural, his face pale, his lips livid, his
breathing depressed, and his entire appearance like that of a furious
madman. The sweat runs from every pore, and tears start from his
strained eyes; after which the symptoms gradually disappear. The priest
looks round with a vacant stare, and, as the god says, 'I depart!'
announces his actual departure by flinging himself down on the mat, or
by suddenly striking the ground with a club, while those at a distance
are informed by blasts on the conch, or by the firing of a musket, that
the deity has returned to the world of spirits. The convulsive movements
do not entirely disappear for some time; they are not, however, so
violent as to prevent the priest from enjoying a hearty meal, or a
draught of yankona or a whiff of tobacco, as either may happen to be at
hand. Several words are used by the natives to express these priestly
shakings. The most common are _sika_ and _kundru_. _Sika_ means to
appear, and is used chiefly of supernatural beings; _kundru_ means to
grunt or grumble. The one refers to the appearance, the other to the
sound attendant upon these inspired shakings.
[Pageheader: AN INSPIRED PRIEST]
As whatever the priest says during the paroxysm is supposed to be direct
from the god, a specimen or two of these responses will be
interesting.... A priest of Ndengei, speaking for that divinity, once
said, "Great Fiji is my small club. Muaimbila is the head; Kamba is the
handle. If I step on Muaimbila I shall sink it into the sea, while Kamba
shall rise to the sky. If I step on Kamba it will be lost in the sea,
and Muaimbila shall rise to the sky. Yes, Vitilevu is my small club. I
can turn it as I please. I can turn it upside down."[61]
The propitiatory offering might be anything from a bunch of cocoanuts
covered with turmeric powder to a great feast. In the last case, part,
called the _singana_, was set apart for the god, the rest apportioned
among the people. In theory the god consumed the spiritual essence of
all the food, and the people ate its grosser fibre. The _singana_ was
eaten by the priest and a few privileged old men; it was tabu to youths
and women.
The psychological aspect of the inspiration of the Fijian priest is
difficult to appreciate. The inspired paroxysm is something more than
conscious deception. Williams was present when a famous Lakemba priest
was questioned by the Tongan chief, Tubou Totai:--
"Lanngu, did you shake yesterday?"
"Yes."
"Did you think beforehand what to say?"
"No."
"Then you just say what you happen to think at the time, do you?"
"No. I do not know what I say. My own mind departs from me, and then,
when it is truly gone, my god speaks by me."
Williams adds that this man "had the most stubborn confidence in his
deity, although his mistakes were such as to shake any ordinary trust.
His inspired tremblings were of the most violent kind, bordering on
frenzy."[62] He was, no doubt, absolutely sincere. In this race, as in
the Hindus and the Malays, there is an undercurrent of hysteria which no
one looking at their placid surface would suspect. In the first heat of
conversion to Christianity it was quite common in the Mission services
for a man to be inspired (by the Holy Spirit, as he said) and to
interrupt the minister with an outburst of gibberish accompanied with
all the contortions that seized the heathen priest. His companions would
try to calm him by patting him gently with soothing exclamations, and
the good missionaries, who had been enlarging on the gift of tongues at
Pentecost, were not a little embarrassed in discouraging the practice.
The "revival" which took place at Viwa in 1845 was a curious instance of
this. To judge from John Hunt's account of it, the entire island was
seized with religious hysteria, and "business, sleep and food were
entirely laid aside" for several days, until the missionaries had to
force the new converts to eat. Such ebullitions are rare in these days,
but that they are still smouldering unsuspected is shown by the
hysterical outbursts of emotion that sometimes take place at the
_Bolotu_ or Night Revival meetings, introduced from Tonga. More than one
generation must come and go before all danger from this neurotic chord
in the Fijian constitution is removed. Any acute cause of native
discontent which might be fanned into active hostility to the white race
would most certainly produce the heathen priest again, and the most
dangerous of these might well be the man who now delivers eloquent
emotional sermons to Wesleyan congregations Sunday after Sunday. Such a
spectacle would shock the European missionaries beyond expression, but
it would not surprise those who know the natives intimately. The schism
of Ndungumoi and the heathen outbreak of Vanualevu in 1895 were but a
bubble from the seething pitch that lies below the placid outer crust of
the converted Fijian.
[Pageheader: THE TOOLS OF THE WIZARD]
Even now a practised eye might pick out from an assembly of Fijians the
sons of the heathen priests, by their shifty glance, their crafty
expression, and their smooth, insinuating address, which are as much a
part of them as the set of their eyes and the colour of their skin.[63]
Witchcraft
_Ndraunikau_ (_lit._, leaves)
In 1618 two women were executed at Lincoln for burying the glove of
Henry, Lord Rosse, in order that "as that glove did rot and waste, so
did the liver of the said lord rot and waste." The belief illustrated by
this trial is found in every people, in every country, and in every age.
Dr. E. B. Tylor has remarked with much force that the occult sciences
are nothing but "bad reasoning." There being obvious relation between a
glove and its owner, between a waxen image and the person it represents,
the sorcerer reasons that what he does to the one will happen to the
other. Health being the normal condition of all, except the very aged,
sickness and death must be the work of some malevolent agency, divine or
human; and, if the sick person is free from all suspicion of sacrilege,
the gods can have no motive for afflicting him. Instead of "Whom the
gods love die young," the primitive man reads "An enemy hath done this."
This theory of disease being once established, it is a short step to the
professional agents of disease, who, for a consideration, will wreck the
health of the strongest man with the simplest of tools--a lock of his
hair, a scrap of his food, or a garment that he has worn. The belief in
such powers is not more wildly foolish than our own theory of microbes
would have seemed if it had been put forward before there were
microscopes to prove its truth. It could at least point to success in
its support, for there can be no doubt whatever that numbers of
bewitched persons did actually die--from fear--and that many sick
recovered as the result of curative counterspells that put new heart
into them.
The terror of witchcraft was never absent from the mind of a Fijian.
Williams relates that the sceptics who laughed at the pretensions of a
priest trembled at the power of the wizard, and that this was the last
superstition to be eradicated from the mind of the convert to
Christianity. It would be more true to say that the Christian native has
never lost it. The professional wizard was not necessarily a priest, but
if he had not the protection of sanctity, he was a person of
considerable courage, for witchcraft was a dangerous profession. The pay
was very high, but since the transaction could never be kept entirely
secret, the wizard had to brave the resentment of his victim's
relations.
[Pageheader: A CHIEF IS BEWITCHED]
The procedure was this: If a man desired the death of a rival he
procured something that had belonged to his person--a lock of hair, the
parings of his nails, a scrap of food, or, best of all, his excreta, for
witchcraft by these produced incurable dysentery. With these he visited
the wizard by night, taking a whale's tooth as an earnest of the reward
that he would pay when the death of his rival was accomplished. The
wizard then prepared the charm by wrapping the object in certain leaves
of magical properties, and burying the parcel in a bamboo case either in
the victim's plantation or in the thatch of his house. In a few days the
man began to sicken--generally, no doubt, because hints of the design
had been conveyed to him--and if the charm could then be discovered and
destroyed, he would recover. But if a diligent search failed, offerings
were made to the gods, or the chief in whose district the wizard lived
was invoked to use his authority. It was more common, however, to fee
another wizard to make the charm innocuous by counterspells, which were
often effective through the fresh hope infused into the sufferer, to the
profit of both practitioners. When the victim died the wizard claimed
his reward by attending the funeral with a blackened face, and bold
indeed would be the employer who dared to bilk him. This practice was
sometimes abused. Any sudden death being ascribed to witchcraft, a
professional wizard, who was entirely innocent, would blacken his face
at the funeral in the hope that some one who had an interest in the
death would pay him the fee he had never earned. Such a case occurred as
late as 1887 at the funeral of Mbuli Mbemana, who died of a chill
contracted in taking a huge _vesi_ log down the river as a king-post for
the council-house at Nandronga. A man with a blackened face was pointed
out to me at the funeral, and shortly afterwards a formal complaint was
made by the dead man's relations against the river tribes of having
fee'd this wizard to compass the Mbuli's death. I summoned them to a
meeting, but all my arguments were impotent against the undoubted fact
that the Mbuli was dead, that the river tribes detested him and had an
interest in his death, and that their wizard had appeared with a black
face at his funeral. _Fiat experimentum_: let them commission their most
famous wizards to compound a spell that no man could withstand--I would
supply them with all the material they wanted--and if I still lived they
would put away this superstition for ever. They discussed the
proposition with gravity, and replied through their spokesman that this
would be no proof at all, for it was well known that white men, who
subsist on outlandish meats, were proof against Fijian spells. There was
with me a Tongan, named Lijiate (the nearest the Tongans can get to
"Richard"), whose enlightened contempt for the dark-mindedness of these
heathen had been expressed with unnecessary emphasis. Him I proffered as
a substitute. But I had reckoned without my host. "Pardon me," he said,
when I asked him for a lock of his hair, "but I almost believe in it
myself." One stout-hearted Fijian servant was ready to step into the
breach, but it was then my turn to interfere, for the knowledge that he
was bewitched would lay the stoutest-hearted Fijian low in less than a
week.[64]
A man, delirious with triumph at his narrow escape, once brought me a
spell that he had found buried in the thatch of his house in Tawaleka.
It was a bamboo six inches long, corked with a tuft of grass. Within was
a shred of _masi_, torn, no doubt, from his clothing and a handful of
withered leaves of some bush shrub. He wished me to hold inquisition
over the countryside in the hope that his enemy would confess the crime,
for _ndraunikan_ had been wisely made a punishable offence. Its utility
has long passed away, and its power for harm remains. Apart from the
death and suffering it may inflict on the victim through terror, it not
infrequently leads to actual violence. The murder of Mbuli Mbureta in
1884 is a notable instance. At the trial of his murderers it was
elicited that a number of disaffected chiefs in his district had fee'd a
wizard to remove him by witchcraft. When weeks had passed, and the
unpopular chief continued in obstinate good health, the wizard's
employers taunted him with his lack of skill, and received a definite
promise of the Mbuli's death before a fixed date. The promise was kept;
the victim disappeared, but when his body was discovered it was found
that the skull had been fractured by an axe-stroke from behind.
In the face of such instances as these it demands some courage to assert
that upon the whole the belief in witchcraft was formerly a positive
advantage to the community. It filled, in fact, the place of a system of
sanitation. The wizard's tools consisting in those waste matters that
are inimical to health, every man was his own scavenger. From birth to
old age a man was governed by this one fear; he went into the sea, the
graveyard or the depths of the forest to satisfy his natural wants; he
burned his cast-off _malo_; he gave every fragment left over from his
food to the pigs; he concealed even the clippings of his hair in the
thatch of his house. This ever-present fear even drove women in the
western districts out into the forest for the birth of their children,
where fire destroyed every trace of their lying-in. Until Christianity
broke it down, the villages were kept clean; there were no festering
rubbish-heaps nor filthy _raras_.
[Pageheader: SOOTHSAYERS]
In this respect Fijian witchcraft was immeasurably superior to that of
other primitive races who employ similar methods. The Gold Coast tribes
slay men by spells of roots tied together with a curse;[65] the
priest-king Laibou of the Wa-Nandi tried to annihilate the Uganda force
sent against him by leaving a snake tied to a dog near their camp.[66]
The Swahili bury medicine at the door of the hut by which the doomed
person must pass.[67] But in none of these cases are the excreta of the
victim necessary, nor does the superstition react in the interest of
public health.
Kinda and Yalovaki
Not less important in the native polity were the wizard's services in
the detection of crime. This was a special branch of the black art, and
the _ndaukinda_ seldom engaged in the deadly business of _ndraunikau_.
When property was stolen the owner took a present to the seer, and told
the story of his loss. The seer, bidding the man pronounce the names of
those whom he suspected, fell into deep abstraction, and presently
checked the man at a certain name, announcing that an itching in his
side or this finger or toe proved the person named to be the thief. If
the seer was a member of the tribe he would dispense with the names, and
would begin to twitch convulsively and himself pronounce the thief's
name. If he was lucky enough to hit upon the right man--and an intimate
knowledge of the characters and relations of his fellow-tribesmen often
enabled him to do so--the offender would confess at once, for to brazen
out a theft against the evidence of a seer's little finger demanded an
effrontery that no Fijian could boast. The proper course for a person
wrongfully accused by a seer was shown in the case of Mbuli Yasawa, who
in 1885 was charged with embezzling the district funds. It appeared that
the funds in question were intact, but that, through an error in
book-keeping, the scribe had led the people to believe that a
considerable sum had been abstracted. Persons were deputed to consult a
noted seer, called Ndrau-ni-ivi, whose finger tingled at the mention of
the Mbuli's name. The poor Mbuli, knowing for the best of reasons that
he was innocent, instead of taking the obvious course of submitting his
books to be audited by the magistrate, presented a larger fee to a rival
seer to "press down" (_mbika_) that given to Ndrau-ni-ivi, and
triumphantly vindicated his character by the verdict of his
practitioner's great toe. Upon this evidence he prosecuted his
slanderers for defamation before the Provincial Court. The cunning and
knack of clever guessing necessary for the lucrative calling of the seer
formerly made the business a monopoly of the priests.
The _yalovaki_ (soul-stealing) was an even surer method of detecting
crime. It was the mildest form of trial by ordeal ever devised, but no
boiling water or hot ploughshare could have been more effective. If the
evidence was strong, but the suspect obstinately refused to confess,
complaint was made to the chief, who summoned the accused, and called
for a scarf. Usually the man confessed at the bare mention of the
instrument, but if he did not, the cloth was waved over his head until
his spirit (_yalo_) was entangled in it, and it was then folded together
and nailed to the prow of the chief's canoe. Then the man went mad, for
the mad are they whose soul have been stolen away.
Charms
There is no unusual feature in the Fijians' belief in charms. They were
carried to avert calamities of all kinds, but principally shipwreck and
wounds in battle. A mountain girl, who had never before seen the sea,
was once a fellow-passenger with me in a stormy passage to Suva. A heavy
lurch of the little vessel threw her sprawling on the deck, and I
noticed that, while the other natives were bantering her, she was crying
bitterly. Her fall had disengaged a pebble from her hand which had been
given her as a talisman against death by drowning. Charms have their
uses in litigation I had once before me a little old man who enjoyed
some reputation for skill in witchcraft. Being sentenced for some petty
offence, he solemnly removed his loin-cloth, and took from between his
thighs a little bag, containing dried root, and flung it away with a
gesture of contempt, much to the amusement of the enlightened native
police, who explained that it was an amulet against conviction.
[Pageheader: TRAPPING THE LITTLE GODS]
The Kalou-rere
The _kalou-rere_ differed from other religious observances in that,
though it was practised in most parts of the group, either under its
prevailing name or that of _ndomindomi_, the form was universal. The
votaries were youths of the male sex only: there was no recognized
priesthood; the cult was rather one of the effervescences of youth which
in England find their vent in the football field and the amateur stage.
The object of the rites was to allure the "Little Gods"--the
_Luve-ni-wai_ (Children of the Water)--a timid race of Immortals, to
leave the sea, and take up their temporary abode among their votaries on
land. Beyond the gift of immunity from wounds in battle, and such
pleasure as may be drawn from the excitement of the secret rites, it is
not clear that the Little People conferred any boon upon their
worshippers commensurate with the labour and privations that worship
entailed, but more than this has been urged against Freemasonry by its
critics.
In a retired place near the sea a small house was built, and enclosed
with a rustic trellis fence, tied at the crossings with a small-leafed
vine, and interrupted by long poles decorated with streamers. Within the
enclosure a miniature temple was erected to contain a consecrated
cocoanut, or some other trifle. No effort was spared to make the place
attractive to the shy little gods; the roof of the house was draped with
_masi_; the wall studded with crab-claws, and span-long yams and painted
cocoanuts were disposed about the foundations that they might eat and
drink.
A party of twenty or thirty youths spent several weeks in this
enclosure, drumming every morning and evening on the ground with hollow
bamboos to attract the sea-gods. During this long period they observed
certain tabus, and spent the days in complete idleness. Williams heard
of a party who, to facilitate the landing of the _Luve-ni-wai_, built a
jetty of loose stones for some distance into the sea. When they were
believed to be ascending, flags were set up in some of the inland passes
to turn back any of them that might try to make for the forests inland.
On the great day a Nanga-like enclosure was made with long poles piled
to a height of twelve inches and covered with green boughs, spears
bearing streamers being set up at the four angles. Within this the lads
sat gaily draped, with their votive offerings of clubs and shells before
them, thumping their bamboo drums on the earth. Presently the officers
of the lodge were seen approaching headed by the _Vuninduvu_, a sort of
past-master, armed with an axe, and capering wildly; the _Lingu-viu_
(Fan-holder) circling madly round the drummers, waving a great fan; the
_Mbovoro_, dancing and carrying in his hand the cocoanut which he is
about to break on his bent knee; the _Lingu-vatu_, pounding his nut with
a stone. Amid a terrific din of shrieks and cat-calls the gods entered
into the _Raisevu_, who thereafter was regarded as a peculiarly favoured
person. Then all went mad; the _Vakathambe_ shouted his challenge; the
_Matavutha_ shot at him, or at a nut which he held under his arm, and
all became possessed with the same frenzy as the inspired priests. One
after another they ran to the _Vuninduvu_ to be struck on the belly,
believing themselves invulnerable, and if the _Vuninduvu_ was
over-simple or over-zealous he sometimes did them mortal injury.
Williams, who gives the above description of the rites, says that in the
old days the orgy was free from licentiousness: we shall see how they
have deteriorated since the conversion of the people to Christianity.
[Pageheader: THE CAREER OF A _RAISEVU_]
On the western coast of Vitilevu the favourite ascending place of the
_Luve-ni-wai_ is marked with a large cairn of little stones, which has
grown year by year with the stones flung upon it by each worshipper and
by every passer-by. The more republican institutions of the western
tribes permit a commoner to rise to considerable influence, and not a
few of these great commoners can trace their eminent career to the
youthful distinction of having been the _Raisevu_. The combination of
hysteria and cunning and impudence necessary to that distinction raised
Nemani Ndreu from the lowly position of a commoner of a Nandi village to
be the official _Roko Tui_ of Mba. At the date of annexation in 1874 he
was _Tui Rara_ (Town-crier); in the heathen outbreak two years later, he
was naturally found upon the winning side, and his services as guide and
spy were so useful that he rapidly rose in Government favour. I was
present at the council when his appointment to the highest office open
to Fijians was announced. In an impassioned speech to a cold and hostile
audience he suddenly burst into tears that coursed down his cheeks and
impeded his utterance, and his most inveterate enemies seemed to be
affected. As we left the council-house he turned to me, with the tears
still wet upon his cheeks, and said, "How then? Didn't I do that well?"
It is unnecessary to add that he was an eminent local preacher.
The _kalou-rere_ was one of the few offences which, under British law,
was punished with flogging, a harsh provision if the rites were as
innocent as Williams represents. The truth is that they have changed
sadly for the worse. The rites are still occasionally practised in
secret, but though the ritual is much the same, it may be doubted
whether any of the votaries believe that they are alluring the "Little
Gods" from the sea. A few lawless young chiefs get a band of roysterers
together in a secluded place, and there go through a travesty of the
rites as an excuse for nocturnal raids upon the hen-roosts of the
neighbouring trader. Usually an equal number of girls are induced to
visit them by night under the pretence of practising heathen dances,
which are, in reality, mere orgies of debauchery. In one of these cases,
reported in detail by the late Mr. Heffernan, stipendiary magistrate of
Ba, the frenzy of the votaries was quite genuine, but it found vent in
sensuality, the dancers having access to their partners in a set measure
controlled by words of command.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 45: Buro-tu, or Bulo-tu as the Samoans and Tongans call it, is
Buro, or Bouro or Bauro with the suffix _tu_, signifying high rank,
which is found in the words _tu-i_ (king) and _tu-ranga_ (chief). There
are two places of that name in the West, namely, Bauro (S. Christoval)
in the Solomon Islands, and Bouro in the Malay Archipelago. Quiros heard
of an Indian, "a great pilot," who had come from Bouro when he visited
Taumaco in the Duff Group in 1606, and Mr. Hale, the philologist in
Wilkes Expedition, tried to establish the identity of the Malay Bouro
with the sacred island, by assuming that the "arrows tipped with
silver," which Quiros says were in possession of this native, showed
that there was communication between Taumaco and the Malay Islands. But,
as Dr. Guppy points out (_The Solomon Islands_, p. 277), the Bouro there
alluded to must have been S. Christoval, which was only 300 miles
distant, and the silver arrows a relic of the Spanish expedition to that
island forty years before. Nevertheless, it is quite possible that S.
Christoval was named Bouro by emigrants from the Malay Island after
their old home, and that S. Christoval was a halting-place of the race
on their journey eastward.]
[Footnote 46: The disgrace of dying a natural death is so keenly felt
that the bodies of the Tui Thakau of Somosomo, and the Rokovaka of
Kandavu, who die naturally, are struck with a stone on the forehead or
clubbed, to avert the contempt of the gods [Waterhouse].]
[Footnote 47: Thus the Fijians explain recovery from trance.]
[Footnote 48: An edible root related to the yam.]
[Footnote 49: There are many poems relating to the gods at
Ndelakurukuru. They are all well known at Namata, where they are
performed on great occasions, such as the feast made on the departure of
the Thakaundrove chiefs.]
[Footnote 50: The Chief of Lakemba used to assure the missionaries that
they could do him no greater favour than to give him a wooden coffin,
that his body might not be trampled on [Williams].]
[Footnote 51: The indigenous fly is nearly extinct. He is larger than
the European species that has supplanted him, and his buzz is louder.]
[Footnote 52: Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_, p. 21.]
[Footnote 53: _The Polynesian Race_, pp. 44, 167, 168.]
[Footnote 54: This was the Fijian deluge. There are traditions of great
floods within historical times. One of them, about 1793, purged the land
of the great Lila epidemic. The waters rose over the housetops; hundreds
were swept away, and the silt left by the receding waters raised the
alluvial flats of the Rewa river several feet, a statement that is borne
out by the fact that a network of mangrove roots underlies the alluvial
soil at a depth of four or five feet. This flood was preceded by a great
cyclone. Traditions of great floods are preserved by almost every
primitive people.]
[Footnote 55: Dengei was supposed to inhabit a cavern in Nakauvandra.]
[Footnote 56: _Oliva_ is the name of Captain Olive, formerly Commandant
of the Armed Constabulary; _virimbaita_ is "to hedge in." The other
words mean nothing.]
[Footnote 57: The alignments at Carnac in Brittany and Merivale on
Dartmoor are suggestive of the rites of the Mbaki.]
[Footnote 58: _Journal Anthrop. Instit._, Vol. xiv, p. 29.]
[Footnote 59: _Internationales Archiv. fuer Ethnographie_, Bd. II, 1889.]
[Footnote 60: Probably Nemani Ndreu, whose career I have described.]
[Footnote 61: Williams's _Fiji and the Fijians_, p. 224.]
[Footnote 62: Williams's _Fiji and the Fijians_, p. 224.]
[Footnote 63: Such a one was Kaikai of Singatoka, whose exploits as a
prison-breaker were set forth in my _Indiscretions of Lady Asenath_.]
[Footnote 64: In 1902, under the flooring stones of a prehistoric
kistvaen near the Sepulchral Circle on Pousson's Common, Dartmoor, two
tresses of human hair were discovered, neatly coiled up. They were
doubtless the record of witchcraft practised within the nineteenth
century, on the same plan as that of the Fijians.]
[Footnote 65: _Nine Years at the Gold Coast_, by Rev. D. Kemp.]
[Footnote 66: _Campaigning on the Upper Nile and Niger_, by Lieut.
Vandeleur.]
[Footnote 67: _East Africa_, by W. W. Fitzgerald.]