The case which originally drew my attention to this topic is that given
by Mr. Basil Thomson in his South Sea Yarns (p. 195). Mr. Thomson
informs me that he wrote his description on the day after he witnessed
the ceremony, a precaution which left no room for illusions of memory. Of
course, in describing a conjuring trick, one who is not an expert
records, not what actually occurred, but what he was able to see, and the
chances are that he did not see, and therefore omits, an essential
circumstance, while he misstates other circumstances. I am informed by
Mrs. Steel, the author of The Potter's Thumb and other stories of Indian
life, that, in watching an Indian conjurer, she generally, or frequently,
detects his method. She says that the conjurer often begins by whirling
rapidly before the eyes of the spectators a small polished skull of a
monkey, and she is inclined to think that the spectators who look at this
are, in some way, more easily deluded. These facts are mentioned that I
may not seem unaware of what can be said to impugn the accuracy of the
descriptions of the Fire Rite, as given by Mr. Thomson and other
witnesses.
Mr. Thomson says that the Wesleyan missionaries have nearly made a clean
sweep of all heathen ceremonial in Fiji. 'But in one corner of Fiji, the
island of Nbengga, a curious observance of mythological origin has
escaped the general destruction, probably because the worthy iconoclasts
had never heard of it.' The myth tells how the ancestor of the clan
received the gift of fire-walking from a god, and the existence of the
myth raises a presumption in favour of the antiquity of the observance.
* * * * *
'Once every year the masawe, a dracaena that grows in profusion on the
grassy hillsides of the island, becomes fit to yield the sugar of which
its fibrous root is full. To render it fit to eat, the roots must be
baked among hot stones for four days. A great pit is dug, and filled
with large stones and blazing logs, and when these have burned down, and
the stones are at white heat, the oven is ready for the masawe. It is at
this stage that the clan Na Ivilankata, favoured of the gods, is called
on to "leap into the oven" (rikata na lovo), and walk unharmed upon the
hot stones that would scorch and wither the feet of any but the
descendants of the dauntless Tui Nkualita. Twice only had Europeans been
fortunate enough to see the masawe cooked, and so marvellous had been the
tales they told, and so cynical the scepticism with which they had been
received, that nothing short of another performance before witnesses and
the photographic camera would have satisfied the average "old hand."
'As we steamed up to the chiefs village of Waisoma, a cloud of blue smoke
rolling up among the palms told us that the fire was newly lighted. We
found a shallow pit, nineteen feet wide, dug in the sandy soil, a stone's
throw from high-water mark, in a small clearing among the cocoanuts
between the beach and the dense forest. The pit was piled high with
great blazing logs and round stones the size of a man's head. Mingled
with the crackling roar of the fire were loud reports as splinters flew
off from the stones, warning us to guard our eyes. A number of men were
dragging up more logs and rolling them into the blaze, while, above all,
on the very brink of the fiery pit, stood Jonathan Dambea, directing the
proceedings with an air of noble calm. As the stones would not be hot
enough for four hours, there was ample time to hear the tradition that
warrants the observance of the strange ceremony we were to see.
'When we were at last summoned, the fire had been burning for more than
four hours. The pit was filled with a white-hot mass shooting out little
tongues of white flame, and throwing out a heat beside which the
scorching sun was a pleasant relief. A number of men were engaged, with
long poles to which a loop of thick vine had been attached, in noosing
the pieces of unburnt wood by twisting the pole, like a horse's twitch,
until the loop was tight, and dragging the log out by main force. When
the wood was all out there remained a conical pile of glowing stones in
the middle of the pit. Ten men now drove the butts of green saplings
into the base of the pile, and held the upper end while a stout vine was
passed behind the row of saplings. A dozen men grasped each end of the
vine, and with loud shouts hauled with all their might. The saplings,
like the teeth of an enormous rake, tore through the pile of stones,
flattening them out towards the opposite edge of the pit. The saplings
were then driven in on the other side and the stones raked in the
opposite direction, then sideways, until the bottom of the pit was
covered with an even layer of hot stones. This process had taken fully
half an hour, but any doubt as to the heat of the stones at the end was
set at rest by the tongues of flame that played continually among them.
The cameras were hard at work, and a large crowd of people pressed
inwards towards the pit as the moment drew near. They were all excited
except Jonathan, who preserved, even in the supreme moment, the air of
holy calm that never leaves his face. All eyes are fixed expectant on
the dense bush behind the clearing, whence the Shadrachs, Meshachs and
Abednegos of the Pacific are to emerge. There is a cry of "Vutu! Vutu!"
and forth from the bush, two and two, march fifteen men, dressed in
garlands and fringes. They tramp straight to the brink of the pit. The
leading pair show something like fear in their faces, but do not pause,
perhaps because the rest would force them to move forward. They step
down upon the stones and continue their march round the pit, planting
their feet squarely and firmly on each stone. The cameras snap, the
crowd surges forward, the bystanders fling in great bundles of green
leaves. But the bundles strike the last man of the procession and cut
him off from his fellows; so he stays where he is, trampling down the
leaves as they are thrown to line the pit, in a dense cloud of steam from
the boiling sap. The rest leap back to his assistance, shouting and
trampling, and the pit turns into the mouth of an Inferno, filled with
dusky frenzied fiends, half seen through the dense volume that rolls up
to heaven and darkens the sunlight. After the leaves, palm-leaf baskets
of the dracaena root are flung to them, more leaves, and then bystanders
and every one join in shovelling earth over all till the pit is gone, and
a smoking mound of fresh earth takes its place. This will keep hot for
four days, and then the masawe will be cooked.
'As the procession had filed up to the pit, by a preconcerted arrangement
with the noble Jonathan, a large stone had been hooked out of the pit to
the feet of one of the party, who poised a pocket-handkerchief over it,
and dropped it lightly upon the stone when the first man leapt into the
oven, and snatched what remained of it up as the last left the stones.
During the fifteen or twenty seconds it lay there every fold that touched
the stone was charred, and the rest of it scorched yellow. So the stones
were not cool. We caught four or five of the performers as they came
out, and closely examined their feet. They were cool, and showed no
trace of scorching, nor were their anklets of dried tree-fern leaf burnt.
This, Jonathan explained, is part of the miracle; for dried tree-fern is
as combustible as tinder, and there were flames shooting out among the
stones. Sceptics had affirmed that the skin of a Fijian's foot being a
quarter of an inch thick, he would not feel a burn. Whether this be true
or not of the ball and heel, the instep is covered with skin no thicker
than our own, and we saw the men plant their insteps fairly on the
stone.'
* * * * *
Mr. Thomson's friend, Jonathan, said that young men had been selected
because they would look better in a photograph, and, being inexperienced,
they were afraid. A stranger would share the gift if he went in with one
of the tribe. Some years ago a man fell and burned his shoulders. 'Any
trick?' 'Here Jonathan's ample face shrunk smaller, and a shadow passed
over his candid eye.' Mr. Thomson concludes: 'Perhaps the Na Ivilankata
clan have no secret, and there is nothing wonderful in their performance;
but, miracle or not, I am very glad I saw it.' The handkerchief dropped
on the stone is 'alive to testify to it.' Mr. Thomson's photograph of
the scene is ill-developed, and the fumes of steam somewhat interfere
with the effect. A rough copy is published in Folk-Lore for September,
1895, but the piece could only be reproduced by a delicate drawing with
the brush.
The parallel to the rite of the Hirpi is complete, except that red-hot
stones, not the pyre of pine-embers, is used in Fiji. Mr. Thomson has
heard of a similar ceremony in the Cook group of islands. As in ancient
Italy, so in Fiji, a certain _clan_ have the privilege of fire-walking.
It is far enough from Fiji to Southern India, as it is far enough from
Mount Soracte to Fiji. But in Southern India the Klings practise the
rite of the Hirpi and the Na Ivilankata. I give my informant's letter
exactly as it reached me, though it has been published before in
Longman's Magazine: