The Mafulu Part 9

Next they bring in the bananas, again singing, and these they hang up on the tall, slender tree poles, and on the platforms of the houses, and under the view platforms, but without ceremony.

Lastly, again singing, they bring in the taro, and hang these up, mixed with the yams (not below them) on the posts, again without ceremony. The hanging up of the taro is left to the last, and, in fact, is not done till it is known that the guests are on their way, as the taro would be spoilt by bad weather.

In hanging the yam and the taro the people all work simultaneously--that is, they are all hanging yams at the same time and all hanging taro at the same time. But as regards the sugar cane and banana each man works in his own time without waiting for, or being waited for by, the others. Women may help the men in all these things, except the ceremonious hanging up of the yams.

They do not, however, hang all the yam, sugar-cane, banana and taro, some of each being kept back in the houses for a purpose which will appear hereafter.

The _ine_ and _malage_ fruits are not hung up at all, but are kept in the _avale_ of the village _emone_ until the day of the actual feast, when the various vegetables and fruits are, as will be seen, put in heaps for distribution among the guests.

They then further decorate the posts with human skulls and bones, which are hung round in circles below the yams and taro, but not reaching to the ground. These are the skulls and bones of chiefs and members of their families and sub-chiefs and important personages only of the community, and the bones used are only the larger bones of the arms and legs; skulls will, so far as possible, be used for the purpose in preference to the other bones. These skulls and bones are taken from wherever they may then happen to be; some of them will be in burial boxes on trees, [70] some may be in graves underground, and some may be hung up in the village _emone_; though it may here be mentioned that those underground and in the _emone_ are not, as I shall show later, in their original places of sepulture.

Finally croton leaves, tied in sheaves, are arranged round the posts below the skulls and bones, so as to decorate the posts down to the ground.

One other specially important matter must here be mentioned. There will probably be in or by the edge of the village enclosure a high box-shaped wooden burial platform, [71] supported on poles, and containing the skull and all the bones of a chief, these platforms and a special sort of tree being, as will be explained later on, the only places where they and their families and important personages are originally buried. If so, the people add to the bones on this platform such of the other skulls and special arm and leg bones, collected as above mentioned, as are not required for decorating the posts. If, as is most improbable, there is no such burial platform, then they erect one, and upon it place all the available skulls and special bones not required for the posts.

These various preparations bring us to the evening before the day of the feast, upon which evening the women, married and unmarried, of the community, whose families have supplied pigs for the feast, dance together in full dancing decorations in the village enclosure, beginning at about sundown, and, if weather permits, dancing all through the night. There is no ceremony connected with this dancing.

The next day is the feast day. The guests are in the special guest houses outside the village, where they are dressing for the dance. They have probably arrived the day before, in which case they may have come into the village to watch the women dancing in the evening; but they are not regarded as having formally arrived. These guests include married and unmarried men, women and children, n.o.body of the invited community being left behind, except old men and women who cannot walk. The women have brought with them their carrying bags, in which they carry all their men's and their own goods (_e.g._, knives, feathers, ornaments, etc.), including not only the things used for the ceremony, but all their other portable property, which they do not wish to expose to risk of theft by leaving at home.

They have also brought special ornamental bags to be used in the dance as mentioned below.

The people of the village in the meantime erect one, two, or three (generally three) trees in a group in the very centre of the village enclosure.

And now come the successive ceremonies of the feast, in which both married and unmarried men and women take part; in describing these ceremonies I will call the people of the community giving the feast the "hosts," and the visitors attending it the "guests."

First: All or nearly all the men hosts go in a body out of the village to the guests' houses, singing as they go. They are all fully ornamented for a feast, but do not wear their special dancing ornaments, and they do not carry their spears, or as a rule any other weapons. Each chiefs ornaments include a bunch of black ca.s.sowary feathers tied round his head behind, and falling down over his shoulders, this being his distinctive ornament; but otherwise his ornaments do not differ from those of the rest, except probably as regards quant.i.ty and quality. The object of this visit is to ascertain if the guests are ready, and if they are not ready the men hosts wait until they are so. Then the men hosts return to the village, singing as before, and all the guests, men and women, follow them; but they do not sing, and they do not enter the village. The men hosts, on returning, retire to their houses and the view platforms, where also are the women hosts, thus leaving the village enclosure empty.

Second: All the women guests, except two, then enter the village. They are fully ornamented for the feast, but do not wear their special dancing ornaments. They all have large carrying bags on their backs, not the common ones of everyday use, but the ornamental ones; and in these they carry and show off all their own and their husbands' riches other than what they respectively are actually wearing. They enter at one end of the village enclosure (I will hereafter call this the "entrance end") by the side of the end _emone_ of the village (this may be the chiefs true _emone_ or it may be the secondary _emone_), and walk in single file along one side of the village enclosure, and half of them walk round the other end (which I will call the "far end") in front of the _emone_ there (which also will be either the true one or the other one), and back again along the other side, until there are two rows of them, _vis-a-vis_ at opposite sides of the enclosure, none of them remaining at the far end in front of the _emone_ there. If they are very numerous, there may be lines on both sides of the enclosure, stretching from end to end; whereas if they are few only, they would be in facing lines at the far end only of the enclosure. This is all done silently.

Third: All the women hosts, fully ornamented for a feast, but without special dancing ornaments, then enter the enclosure at the entrance end, and congregate at the far end of it, in front of the far _emone_ and between the two facing lines of women guests, and facing towards the centre of the enclosure. The group of them stretches as far forward towards the centre of the enclosure as their number allows; but it will never extend beyond the special trees, which have been last erected in the centre. This also is done in silence.

Fourth: The two women guests excluded from the general entry now come in. They are presumably the wives of chiefs. They are also decorated for the feast, but without full dancing ornaments. Each of them, however, holds in her mouth something intended to give her a terrible appearance, probably two pairs of pigs' tusks, one pair curling, crescent-like, upwards, and the other pair similarly curling downwards, or a piece of cloth; but this is only carried by her for this particular scene of the performance, and not afterwards. Each of them also carries two spears, one in each hand. These two women rush into the village enclosure, one entering at each side of the _emone_ at the entrance end. They run along the two sides of the enclosure, one at each side, in front of the lines of women guests already there (between them and the central group of host women), brandis.h.i.+ng their spears as they do so, but in silence. When they reach the far end of the enclosure they meet each other in front of the _emone_ there; and then, if that happens to be the true (chief's) _emone_, they brandish their spears in a hostile manner at the building, the spears sometimes even striking it, though they do not leave the women's hands, and there is probably a little pause or halt in their running for the purpose of this attack. They then pa.s.s each other, and return as they had come, still brandis.h.i.+ng their spears, but each on the opposite side, until they are both at the entrance end of the enclosure. If the _emone_ at this end is the true _emone_, then the attack is made upon it, instead of upon the other one. They then generally again pa.s.s each other, and go round the enclosure a second time, and again attack the _emone_ exactly as before. During the first part of this performance the host women congregated in the far end of the enclosure are all dancing a sort of non-progressive goose step, there being, however, no singing. But, when the two guest women on the return journey of their second circuit reach the front row of the host women, the latter advance in a body silently dancing (but not travelling so fast as the two guest women) down the enclosure, and so following the two guest women, until they are all congregated at the entrance end of the enclosure. The positions of the _dramatis personae_ up to and including the stage of proceedings lastly described will be better understood by reference to Fig. 7 and its accompanying notes. At the end of this stage the lines of guest women are still as shown; but the two special guest women and all the host women are at the entrance end of the enclosure.

Fifth: Such of the guest men as are not going to join in the real ultimate dance (see heading 9) enter the village at the entrance end, they also being fully ornamented, but not wearing their special dancing ornaments. They carry their spears, and perhaps in their other hands their clubs or adzes. Any chiefs who may be among them wear their black ca.s.sowary feather ornaments, like those of the host chiefs. They all advance along the enclosure, jumping and dancing and brandis.h.i.+ng their spears, but not singing; and in front of them go all the host women, dancing as before, also in silence. This double body of people, host women in front, and guest men behind, advance _en ma.s.se_ along the village enclosure. When, in doing this, the guest men reach the three last-erected special trees in the middle of the enclosure, they attack the trees with their spears, never letting the spears leave their hands, and with kicks, and thus try to knock the trees down. If they succeed in doing so, then this part of the performance is at an end, and these guest men disperse and spread about at both sides and ends of the village; but the host and guest women return from wherever they are to the entrance end. If the guest men's first attack on the trees is not successful, they pa.s.s them, and continue their advance, as before, to the far end of the enclosure and return back again in the other direction, the host women still dancing in front of them; and on this return journey they repeat their attack on the trees. If again unsuccessful, they go on to their starting point, and go a second time through the same performance as before, going up the enclosure, and, if necessary, down again; and, if still unsuccessful, they will probably try a third time, the host women always dancing in front of them as before. The whole of this is one continuous movement, going on till the trees are down. If after the third double attempt the guest men have still been unsuccessful, they relinquish their efforts; and in that case the pig-killer of the hosts' village (as to whom see below) steps forward, and cuts down the trees with his adze. When the trees are down, the performance is at an end, the guest men retire, and the host and guest women return to the entrance end, as above stated.

Sixth: Such of the chiefs of the guests as do not intend to join in the real ultimate dance (heading 9) then step forward into the enclosure at the entrance end. Their number may be two or three or more. They wear their full dancing ornaments, including their black ca.s.sowary feather ornaments and the enormous feather erections on their heads, which for chiefs are even larger and heavier than for other people. They carry their drums, but not spears or clubs or adzes. The two special guest women who have already been mentioned and two other guest women, all with their full dancing ornaments, also come forward. A line is formed with the chiefs in the middle and the four women at the two ends. In front of this line are all the host women, still decorated as before, but without special dancing ornaments. Then the whole group, host women in front and the guest chiefs and their four attendant guest women in a line behind, dance forward along the enclosure. In doing this, they face the direction in which they are progressing, and their progress is slow. This is done to the accompaniment of the beating by the dancing chiefs of their drums, but there is no singing. When the dancing party reach the far end of the enclosure, they go back again in the same way; and so on again until the chiefs (with the great weights they are carrying) are tired; then they stop. But the men hosts thereupon politely press them to go on again, giving them in fact a sort of complimentary encore, and this they will probably do. After about half-an-hour from the commencement of the dancing they finally stop. Then the chief of the clan in one of whose villages the dance is held comes forward and removes the heavy head-pieces from the dancing chiefs.

Seventh: An important ceremony now occurs. The chief of the clan cuts away the supports of the burial platform already mentioned, whereupon the platform falls to the ground, and the skulls and bones upon it roll on the ground. These are picked up, and the skulls and big arm and leg bones are put on one side. There is no singing or ceremony in connection with this. The platform is not rebuilt; and what is afterwards done with the skulls and bones will be seen hereafter.

Eighth: There is now a distribution among the chiefs and more important male guests of the yam, taro, sugar-cane and bananas, which at the time of the hanging up on the village posts were kept back and put into the houses, and of tobacco. The chief of the clan, with help from others, makes a number of heaps of these things in the centre of the village enclosure, the number of heaps corresponding to the number of recipients. Then, standing successively before each of these heaps, he calls out in turn the names of the men who are to receive them, chiefs being given the first priority, and specially important people the next. Each man comes forward, usually bringing with him his wife or some other woman with a bag, picks up his heap, and takes it away. And so with all of them in turn, till all is finished. On each heap there is usually, but not always, a portion of a village pig, which has that morning been killed under the burial platform, before it was cut down. The guests, men and women, then return to the guest houses, where the women cook the food which has been given, and it is eaten by the men and themselves.

Ninth: The real dance now takes place, beginning perhaps at 9 or 10 in the evening, and lasting the whole night, and perhaps till 10 o'clock the following morning. The dancing is done by some only of the guest men, and none of their women, and none of the hosts, either men or women, join in it. The dancers are all arrayed in full dancing ornaments, including their heavy head feather erections, and chiefs also wear their ca.s.sowary feathers; and they all carry their drums and spears, and sometimes clubs or adzes. After the dance has begun, the chief of the clan in whose village the dance occurs distributes, with a.s.sistance, among the more important of these dancers, especially chiefs, the skulls and bones which had been put on one side after the cutting down of the burial platform, and probably some or all of the skulls and bones which had been hung upon the big posts; and the dancers receiving these skulls and bones wear them as additional decoration upon their arms throughout the dance. Guest chiefs dance with the others, but owing to the heavy weight of the head ornaments they have to carry, they will be tired sooner than the others. The dancing party enter the village at the entrance end, walking backwards. Directly after they have entered the village they, still having their backs to it, begin to beat their drums, after doing which for a short time they turn round, and the dancing begins. The dancers beat their drums whilst dancing, but neither they nor the other people sing during the actual dancing. There are, however, intervals in the dancing (not the mere rest intervals, such as they have in Mekeo, and which they also have in Mafulu, but intervals which are themselves an actual part of the dance), and during these intervals the drums are not being beaten, and the dancers and the other people, hosts, guests, men and women, all sing. I shall have something more to say about dancing generally later on. At a subsequent stage the skulls and bones with which the dancers have been decorated, including those which had fallen from the burial platform, are all again hung up among the other skulls and bones on the big posts.

Tenth: This is the stage at which occur various other ceremonies, which, though themselves quite distinct from that of the big feast, and performed, often several of them together, when there is no big feast, are also, some or all of them, generally or always introduced into it, as being a convenient occasion for them. The ceremonies in question are those connected with the a.s.sumption of the perineal band, admission to the _emone_ and the giving of the right to carry a drum and dance, that of nose-piercing, and that on the devolution of chieftains.h.i.+p. The nose-piercing ceremony has already been described. The others will be dealt with later.

Eleventh: Next comes the general distribution among the guests of the vegetables and fruits, including all those which have been hung up and displayed, as above described, and the _ine_ fruit, prepared in two ways, and _malage_ fruit. Every male guest who has joined in the real dance is, speaking generally, ent.i.tled to have a share; though sometimes, where there are two or three members of one family, shares may be given to one or two of them only, instead of to each. The chiefs of the community giving the feast work together in carrying out the distribution. The various things are collected into a number of heaps about the village, the number of heaps corresponding to the number of portions to be distributed; and each heap contains something of everything. Excluded from these heaps, however, are the _ine_ seeds which have been put on strings and preserved separately, as before explained. For these are erected stakes about 10 feet high, round which the strings of seeds are twined. The number of these stakes is less than the number of heaps, because they are only planted near to the heaps which contain none of the _ine_ fruit prepared the other way, so that each dancing guest gets some of this fruit, done in either one way or the other. Then the chiefs of the hosts'

community stand round one of the heaps and shout wildly, calling upon the recipient. This may be done by name, or it may in the case of a chief be done by the name of a spot, say a mound or hollow, adjoining the village from which he comes. Here, again, priority is given first to chiefs, and next to important personages. The man so called upon comes running forward with his wife or another woman, picks up his vegetables and fruit, and runs back again with them. Then the chiefs go on to another heap, and again afterwards to the others, one by one, going through the same process in each case, until everything has been distributed. Some of the women then go back to their own villages, carrying with them a portion of the food which has been given to their husbands, but leaving the rest with the latter. Sometimes some of the guest men go home also. But anyone who is proposing to return to the village of the feast must leave some of his food, or bring food on his return, as no more will be given to him.

Twelfth: The next stage is the collection of the village pigs. This may take some time, as many of them are running about in the bush, and have to be caught; and some of them have been agisted out as above mentioned, and have to be fetched. This may involve a delay of a week or ten days, during which most or all of the guests remain, sleeping in their guest houses at night, and perhaps roaming about among other villages in the neighbourhood by day. During this interval there is neither singing nor dancing.

Thirteenth: The village pigs are all brought in alive, and placed under the houses of the village, each pig having its legs tied up and being tied to the house. When all is ready, the chief of the clan announces that the killing of the pigs will take place on the following morning.

Fourteenth: The next morning all the people, both hosts and guests, are in the village to watch the pig-killing; and people from other communities, who are not guests, and will not receive any pig, come too. The pigs are brought out one by one, and killed by hitting them on the head with clubs or adzes or anything else. This is not a chiefs duty. There is a man who is the recognised pig-killer, and who, as already stated, will probably be a man of some position, though not either a chief or a sub-chief. Where there are many pigs, as at the big feast, there will be a number of other men helping him. Each pig is killed on the site of the burial platform which has been cut down. As the pigs are killed, their bodies are carried away and placed on the ground in a row, commencing at the end of the village enclosure, and forming a central line along it; and it is usual also to place upon the row of dead pigs a continuous line of long thin poles, laid end to end, which are afterwards kept tied to the _emone_ as a record of the total length of the line of pigs, and thus of the number of pigs killed. The number of pigs killed is generally very large in proportion to the size of the community giving the feast, much more so than is the case in the villages of Mekeo and the coast. It may be anything from fifty to over one hundred; in fact at a recent feast given by a community of seven villages, having between them about a hundred houses, they killed 135 pigs. Some chiefs of the hosts' community then take some of the bones (not skulls) from the big posts, and dip them into the mouths of the pigs, from which the blood is flowing. They have been seen to dip one bone into several pigs. There does not appear to be any method of selection of the bones to be dipped. They then touch with the bones which have been so dipped the skulls and all the other bones on the posts, which include the skulls and other special bones of all the chiefs and members of their families and other prominent people buried in and by the villages of the community since the last previous big feast was held there. After this all the bones are again hung up on the posts. I may say here in advance that, when the feast is over, all the bones are removed from the posts; and, the ceremony as regards those bones having been performed, they will never again be the subject of ceremonial observance. They, or some of them, may be hung up in the _emone_, but if so it is known that they are not to be used again for ceremonial purposes; or they may be put in a box in a tree, or hung up on a tree, not necessarily of the special species used for burying; or they may be simply flung away anywhere in the bush. Whilst the bodies of the slain pigs lie in a line, and before the cutting up, it is the duty of each man who has had a pig fed up for him to pay the man who has done so, the payment probably being a string of dogs' teeth, or head feather ornaments. Next, the hosts set to work to cut up the pigs. This is not done by a chief or special person, nor is there any ceremony connected with it. Each pig is cut into seven parts, namely, (1) the head, (2-5) the four legs, (6) the bowels and internal parts, and (7) the back and sides. I was told that each part of each pig is destined for a certain person, as arranged beforehand. It follows that, if there are, say, 100 pigs, there are 700 predestined pieces, which are known and remembered, though there are no means of recording them. It is difficult to believe the truth of this, but I was a.s.sured that it was correct. The pieces of each pig are placed on banana leaves, by the side of the spot where the body had lain, and all the pieces are distributed among the male guests. Everybody who has given a pig knows the length of each part of it, though he could not express it in numerals. Each male guest has a piece given to him, which, if the feast be a return feast, will correspond in some way, which I could not understand, with what he had himself provided at the previous feast. But dancers receive larger and better portions than do mere singers. People who have fed up pigs for members of the hosts' community also receive portions. In the distribution of pig each man is called in turn as before, and in the same order of priority, and runs up and gets his piece of pig, and runs back with it; but in this case he is not accompanied by a woman.

Fifteenth: The feast is now over, and all the guests return to their homes, taking away with them everything that has been given to them.

Sixteenth: The village has, however, to undergo a process which I may perhaps call purification. As soon as possible after the guests have gone, the men of the community go off into the bush and capture wild pigs, for which purpose they may have to hunt for three or four days, or even for a week or more. They must have at least one pig, and they generally have two or more, even up to six. When caught, the pigs are brought alive into the village, and are killed upon the site of the cut-down burial platform, this being done by the pig-killer. The pigs are then cut up and eaten by the members of the villages of the community, those of the village itself eating their portions there, and those of the other villages taking their portions away and eating them in their own villages. Except as regards the killing of the pigs on the site of the grave, the whole performance appears to be quite informal. After the eating of the pigs, perhaps on the same day, or if, as is probable, the feast lasts until late in the evening, then on the next day, the women of the village clear away the filthy mess of blood and garbage by which the village enclosure is filled, and sweep the enclosure from end to end with branches of trees. Then the bulk of the villagers leave the village and go off into the gardens and the bush for a period of about six months. The feast has denuded the village of food, including even sweet potatoes, to which they have had no time to attend during the period before the feast, and which have been used up in the feeding of the village pigs required for it. New gardens are needed, and therefore new bush has to be cut down, and the land must be cleared and planted with various things, and especially with sweet potato. For this purpose it is requisite or usual for them to build temporary houses on the scene of their labours, in which the people live. The old people, however, remain in the village, as do also some of the younger ones, who have to tend the gardens close to it. At the end of the period they all return, and village life goes on as usual. What the idea in the native mind may be concerning what I have called the purification of the village is a matter upon which I was unable to find any clue, beyond what may be suspected from the actual facts of the proceeding; but I think it probably has a superst.i.tious origin. Although in theory all the village pigs have been killed and given to the guests at the big feast, there are always some left wandering in the bush, which have not been caught. These pigs are, however, never used in the purification ceremony, in which they always kill wild pigs only. It has been suggested to me that a reason for this may be that, if they killed village pigs, they would thereby advertise the fact that they had not killed and distributed all their village pigs at the big feast; but this hardly seems to be a satisfactory explanation. It clearly falls to the ground as regards present intent if, as I was told, there always is an unkilled residue of village pigs after a big feast. The practice of killing wild pigs only would seem to a.s.sociate itself with the fact that pigs killed at this ceremony are eaten in the village itself, for there seems to be no doubt that among the Mafulu people village pigs are never eaten in their own village on ceremonial occasions; and indeed it seems doubtful whether they are ever eaten there at all.

In fact, it appears to be a general custom in connection with all ceremonial feasts to which outside guests are invited, to kill village pigs only at the feast, and for these to be given to the guests to be eaten by them in their own villages, and afterwards to have a second feast, to which outside guests are not invited, and at which wild pigs are killed, and eaten by the villagers themselves within the village.

The pig-killing is generally, and perhaps always, done in the morning.

It is thought by the Mafulu Fathers of the Mission as regards the subsequent partial desertion of the village that, although it is only partial, and although there is a practical reason for it, it is based upon superst.i.tion, and is regarded by the people as being a formal leaving of the village, pending its complete purification.

Plates 67 to 70 are reproductions of four photographs which Father Clauser was good enough to give me, the two former ones having been taken at the big feast held in the village of Amalala in the year 1909 and the two latter prior to and at a big feast held in the village of Seluku.

I have thought it better to avoid the insertion of frequent, and perhaps somewhat confusing, references to these plates in the body of my notes upon the feast, and to take the plates separately, drawing attention to what appear to be points of interest in them.

Plate 67 represents the scene at Amalala immediately prior to or during the general distribution of vegetables and fruits (_ante_ heading 11). A comparison of this scene with the village in its normal condition, as shown in Plates 56 and 57, gives some idea of the very extensive and elaborate preparations which are made for the feast. On the right hand side are seen some view platforms, and beyond them on the same side is a normal house. Here and there are the big posts surrounded with bamboo stems (notice these posts denuded of their bamboo appendages still remaining in the village enclosure as shown in Plates 56 and 57). Some of the vegetables are seen still hanging upon these post cl.u.s.ters, and near the base of two of them are seen the sheaves of croton leaves. There are apparently no skulls and bones upon the posts seen in the plate, but possibly the re-hanging of these had not been attended to when the photo was taken, or perhaps they had been suspended to other posts not shown in the photograph. Upon the ground are the heaps of vegetables, and close to some of these are the stakes round which are twined strings of seeds of the _ine_ Panda.n.u.s.

Plate 68 is a photograph taken after the subsequent pig-killing, and shows the pigs' bodies lying in a row along the centre of the village enclosure, with the measuring line of poles placed above them. It will be noticed that the elaborate view platforms have been cleared away, but that the bamboo stems have not yet been removed from their central posts.

Plate 69 represents a scene at Seluku prior to a big feast then about to be held. The view platforms have not yet been erected. But the post cl.u.s.ters have been erected, and the yams and croton leaves have been hung upon them. In the centre of the village enclosure is the chief's grave platform, which will be cut down during the festivities in the way above described.

The bones of the chief are in the box-like receptacle at the top of the structure, and the receptacle rather further down (underneath the other one) contains the bones of a chief's child.

Plate 70 shows five men at the Seluku feast with full dancing ornaments, including the great feather head ornaments. One of them has donned a piece of European calico, and the one to the extreme right appears to have done the same. These would doubtless be regarded as highly decorative additions. A few long thin dancing ribbons can be seen hanging from their belts. The elaborate carved (turtle?) sh.e.l.l ornament hanging over the breast of the man to the left is certainly not of Mafulu make, and has probably come from the coast. I never saw anything like it when I was at Mafulu. The two boys in front are holding the ornament of elaborately prepared strings of feathers hung upon a stick, and worn by dancers on their backs, and into which the best feathers are generally put.

CHAPTER IX

Some other Ceremonies and Feasts

Ceremony on Birth.

There is no ceremony on the birth of a child, except in the case of the first-born of a chief. On this occasion the women of a neighbouring community are invited. They come in their full dancing ornaments, and armed in both hands with spears and either clubs or adzes. They rush into the village, first to the chiefs house and then to his _emone_; and at each of these they make a warlike demonstration, actually hurling their spears at the buildings with such force that the spears sometimes go through the thatch of the roof. Then follows a distribution of vegetables among the visitors, after which one, two, or three village pigs are killed under a chiefs burial platform or on the site of a past one, cut up in the ordinary way, as at the big feast, given to the visitors and taken away by them, and the ceremony is over. There is no singing. [72]

Ceremony on a.s.sumption of Perineal Band.

This ceremony is performed for both boys and girls, and usually for several at one time.