[Note: this transcription was produced by an automatic OCR engine]

VAO IO 5

brought to his gamal, and the whole morning passed
in distributing the gifts, each family receiving a few
yams, a little pig, some sprouted cocoa-nuts and a
few rolls of money. This money consists of long,
narrow, fringed mats, neatly rolled up; in this case
they were supposed to be the mats in which the dead
are buried, and which are taken out of the grave
after a while. These mats formerly served as small
coin, as similar mats are still used on other islands,
and they still represent a value of about one shilling ;
but in daily life they have been quite replaced by
European coin, and only appear on such ceremonial
occasions.

All the gifts were piled up, and when the host
was convinced that every guest had received his just
dues, he took a stick and smashed the heads of all
the pigs that were tied up in readiness for this
ceremony. They struggled for a moment, the dogs
came and licked the blood, and then each guest took
away his portion, to have a private feast at home.
The whole performance made a desperately business—
like impression, and everything was done most
'prosaically; as for me, having no better dinner than
usual to look forward to, I quite missed the slightly
excited holiday feeling that ought to go with a great
feast. Formerly, the braining of the pigs was done
with skilfully carved clubs, instead of mere sticks, and
this alone must have given the action something of
solemnity; but these clubs have long since been sold
to collectors and never replaced.

In spite of their frequent intercourse with whites,