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

548 MALEKULA
Further, should a man dream that someone who is alive comes
and talks with him, it is thought that it is the nimwinin of this
person which has come. At the same time, however, the natives
do not apparently go so far as to say that the body of a man
thus met in a dream is temporarily without its nimwinin.
There are certain localities which have the property of
producing apparitions of people who are really distant at the
time. Thus one day Limar, the wife of Roovun, a school teacher,
was walking past such a place in company with another woman.
Presently they saw what they believed to he Roovun coming to
meet them, but he suddenly disappeared among the trees. They
looked for him but they could not ï¬Ånd him. Some time later
he came up and they said: "Where have you been all this
time ? We saw you here before,“ But he denied having been
in that place earlier in the day. These apparitions are not
regarded quite as flames ; they are only a peculiarity of such
places, like mirages in the desert.
The pig and certain plants are also believed to have nimwinin.
That of the pig is called nimnï¬Ån. The nivmzdm of a pig of well-
developed tusk-curvature, as for instance, one of imaap or higher
grade, is powerful, more powerful even than the spirit of some
human beings. Thus if a small boy were to partake of the flesh
of a pig of high grade, the mlminviin of the animal would be
stronger than the nimwinin of the child and would devour it,
so that the boy would die. Should a child who has eaten the
flesh of one of these big pigs be seen to scratch himself a great
deal, it is said that it is the nivï¬Ånvtin which is too strong for him
and is causing the itch. Other animals of less importance, such
as dogs and fowls, do not possess niviinviin. The plants which have
spirits or souls are sacred ones, mzui ilen. They include the cycas
(nimweil), the cordylines (mzari), mlml mm? (a tree used in a certain
variety of death magic), ninggalat mbu 0 (to which variety belongs
the tree whence the people of Loorlanggalat are descended),
and mini mala. Curiously enough the croton, although it is a
mini ileo, has no spirit. The spirit of the naai mala can he
frequently seen at night in the bush and in this visible form it is
known as temes mbat ai and is one of the principal non~human
bush spirits. Sometimes these “sacred trees â€ù, especially the
mbal avrrr, are heard to give small explosive sounds, when the
bark cracks, and the sap or " blood " of the tree is seen to exude.