THE FIJI ISLANDERS.

The annexation of the Fiji Islands to the British empire lends to the practices and beliefs of their inhabitants a peculiar interest, though to a great extent these have been abandoned since the establishment of Christianity.

Their creed is undiluted polytheism; their pantheon is full of all kinds of gods, differing in rank and power, and very widely represented on earth by some animate or inanimate object. Each Fijian has a god of his own, under whose care he supposes himself to be placed. They do not seem to have any religious teaching; but they have a priesthood, and that priesthood has, of course, its traditional formulas of worship. But nothing like regular worship, as Christians understand the phrase, is accepted or observed, and the Fijian religion is really a superstition, because its sole inspiring motive is fear. This motive the priests carefully develope, making it the basis of their claims and the source of their influence.

No man can gain access to the gods except through the priests; and the priests insist upon liberal offerings. When the worshipper comes upon questions of importance, the Soro or sacrifice consists of whales’ teeth and large quantities of food. For matters of inferior moment, the god is content with a mat, a club, a spear, or a tooth, or even young nuts coated with turmeric powder. On one occasion, when the chief Tuikilakila solicited the help of the Somo-somo gods in war, he built a large new temple to the war-god, and presented a quantity of cooked food, numerous turtles, and whales’ teeth.Part of the offering, or sogaria, is set apart for the god, and the rest forms a feast to which everybody is invited. The god’s portion, as the reader will immediately conclude, is eaten by the priest and old men, but to the younger members of the community is strictly tapu.

Strangers who desire to consult a god begin by cutting a pile of firewood for the table. Sometimes only a whale’s tooth and a dish of yams are presented. It is not necessary that the offering should be made in the temple. Mr. Williams speaks of priests to whom the inspiration came in a private house or in the open air.

He who designs to consult the oracle dresses and anoints himself, and, attended by his friends, goes to the priest, who, we will suppose, has been previously informed of the intended visit, and is lying near the sacred corner, preparing his response. When the votary arrives, the priest rises and sits so that his back is near the white cloth by which the god visits him, while the others occupy the opposite side. The votary presents a whale’s tooth, states the object of his visit, and expresses a hope that the god will regard him with favour. Sometimes in front of the tooth is placed a dish of scented oil, with which the priest anoints himself, and then receives the tooth, eyeing it with deep and serious attention.

Unbroken silence follows. The priest, says Mr. Williams, grows absorbed in thought, and all gaze upon him with unwavering steadfastness. In a few minutes he trembles; his face appears slightly distorted, and twitching movements are seen in his limbs. These increase to a violent muscular action, which spreads until the whole frame is strongly convulsed, and the man shivers as with an ague fit. In some islands, adds Mr. Williams, this is accompanied with sobs and murmurs, the veins expand, and the circulation of the blood is quickened.

The priest is now possessed by his god, and all his words and actions are henceforth considered as the god’s and not his own. Shrill cries of “Koi au! Koi au!” (It is I! It is I!) fill the air, and are supposed to indicate the deity’s approach. While delivering the oracle, the priest’s eyes stand out and roll, as if a frenzy had seized him; his voice is unnatural and his face pallid; his lips turn white; his breathing is laboured; and his whole appearance resembles that of “a furious madman.” The perspiration streams from every pore; the tears start from his strained eyes. But by degrees the symptoms disappear, and the priest stares around with purposeless gaze. Then as the god says “I depart,” he throws himself down violently on the mat, or suddenly beats the ground with a club; whereupon those at a distance are informed by blasts on the conch, or the discharge of a musket, that the deity has returned into the world of spirits.

It would be a mistake to conclude that in these scenes the priest-actor is always a conscious impostor; he is frequently the victim of his own imagination, which he stimulates into an excess of frenzy.

The Fijians conceive that the way to Buruto, or Heaven, is impeded by many difficulties, except for the great chiefs, and that, therefore, the only certain plan for a man of inferior rank is to impose upon the god with a lie,—declaring himself to be a chief with so much earnestness that the god believes him, and allows him to pass! Probably in no other creed is admission to heaven made to depend upon a lie! With his war club and a whale’s tooth on his shoulder, the spirit journeys to the world’s end. There grows the sacred pine, at which the spirit hurls his whale’s tooth. If he miss the mark, his journey comes to an abrupt termination; if he hit it, he travels onward until he reaches the spot where the spirits of the women murdered at his death await his arrival.

With these faithful attendants he goes forward, but is opposed by a god called Ravuyalo, against whom he employs his club. If he be defeated, the god kills and eats him; if he conquer, he again goes forward until he falls in with a canoe. Embarking, he is conveyed to the celestial heights where dwells the supreme god, Ndengei. Over the brink of the cliff stretches the long-steering oar of the god’s canoe. He is asked his name and rank, and to this inquiry he replies with a detailed and very imaginative recital of his greatness and opulence, the heroic deeds he has achieved, the devastation he has effected, and the realms over which he has ruled. He is then commanded to seat himself on the blade of the oar, and, if his story have met with credence, he is borne aloft into Buruto; if Ndengei disbelieves it, the oar is tilted up, and he is hurled down for ever into the watery depths of blackness.

Bachelors are not admitted into Buruto, because as we have stated, the spirit waits for his wives, to prove that he is married. And if an unmarried man venture on the journey, a goddess called the Great Woman, throws herself in his way. She bears towards bachelors an implacable hatred, and no sooner sees one than she springs upon him and tears him to pieces. In her haste she sometimes misses him; but even then he has to contend against another god, who conceals himself by the side of the path, and as the bachelor spirit passes by, leaps upon him, and dashes him against a stone.

There is a ghastliness about the funeral ceremonies of the Fijians which far surpasses even the dreary desolation of those in vogue among ourselves.

In common with several other savage tribes they hold that men and women who have grown decrepit and infirm have lived their lives, and should withdraw from this world of activity. Accordingly though they may be neither dead nor dying, preparations are made for their interment. And it seems that the moribund themselves do not object to this summary anticipation of the moment of dissolution; on the contrary, when they become sensible of infirmity, they invite their sons to strangle them. While the sons, far from objecting to an act of parricide, will intimate to their aged parents, if they delay the request, that they have lived long enough, and that it will be well for them to enjoy the rest of the grave. On both sides this singular conduct is due apparently to the Fijian belief that the condition of the spirit in the next world will exactly resemble that of the individual in this; and consequently everybody is desirous to cross the threshold while he retains some degree of activity of body.

Alone we must die, but we need not pass alone into the spirit-world! Such is the conviction of the Fijians, and accordingly they provide a dead chief with attendants, by strangling at his grave his favourite wives. And they slay a valiant warrior that he may precede him on his journey, and do battle for him with all evil spirits or demons. These victims are called “grass,” and lie at the bottom of the chieftain’s grave; the wives decked out in fleecy folds of the softest masi, the servants with their various implements in their hands, and the warrior equipped for the strife, with his favourite club by his side. No resistance is offered by any one of the sufferers; no attempt is made to escape; all seem to contend for the honour of escorting their chief into the other world.

Mr. Williams was present at the funeral of the King of Somo-somo in August, 1845. Age was beginning to tell upon him, but there was no immediately dangerous symptom, and on the 21st, when Mr. Williams visited him, he was better than he had been for two or three days before. Judge, then, of the missionary’s surprise, when, on the 24th, he was informed that the king was dead, and that preparations were being made for his interment, he could scarcely believe the report. The ominous word “preparations” induced him to hasten at once to the scene of action, but his utmost speed failed to bring him to Nasima, the king’s house, in time. The moment he entered it was evident that, as far as concerned two of the women, he was too late to save their lives. The effect of that ghastly scene was overwhelming. Scores of deliberate murderers in the very act surrounded him; yet was there no confusion, and the unearthly horrid stillness was broken only by an occasional word from him who presided. Nature seemed to lend her aid to enhance the impression of horror; there was not a breath in the air, and the half subdued light in that hall of death revealed every object with unusual distinctness.

“All was motionless as sculpture, and”—writes Mr. Williams—“a strange feeling came upon me, as though I was myself becoming a statue. To speak was impossible; I was unconscious that I breathed; and involuntarily, or rather against my will, I sank to the floor, assuming the cowering posture of those who were actually engaged in murder. My arrival was during a hush, just at the crisis of death, and to that strange silence must be attributed my emotions; and I was but too familiar with murders of this kind, neither was there anything novel in the apparatus employed. Occupying the centre of that large room were two groups, the business of whom could not be mistaken.

“All sat on the floor; the middle figure of each group being held in a sitting posture by several females, and hidden by a large veil. On either side of each veiled figure was a company of eight or ten strong men, one company hauling against the other a white cord which was passed twice round the neck of the doomed one, who thus in a few minutes ceased to live. As my self-command was returning to me the group furthest from me began to move; the men slackened their hold, and the attendant women removed the large covering, making it into a couch for the victim.”

Mr. Williams now repaired to the hut of the deceased king, to intercede with his successor on behalf of the other intended victims. Judge of his surprise and horror to find the king still alive. He was very feeble, it was true, but he retained complete consciousness, and occasionally put his hand to his side as his cough shook and tortured him. The young king seemed overcome with grief, and embracing Mr. Williams, said: “See, the father of us two is dead.” He regarded his father’s movements, even his speaking and taking food, as mechanical; in his view, the spirit had departed, and nothing remained but an infirm, and, therefore, valueless body. The preparations for the funeral were not interrupted, and Mr. Williams could obtain no hearing for his expostulations. The young chief’s principal wife and an attendant busily dusted his body with black powder, as if dressing him for the war-dance; and bound his arms and legs with long rolls of white masi, tied in rosettes, with the ends streaming on the ground. He was attired in a new masi robe, which fell about him in ample folds; his head was decorated with a scarlet handkerchief, arranged turban-wise, and ornamented with white cowrie-shells, strings of which flashed on his dusky arms; while round his neck depended an ivory necklace, composed of long curved claw-like pieces of whale’s teeth.

At the sound of a couple of conch-shells the chiefs present did homage, so to speak, to their new king, who was still deeply affected, and gazing on the body of one of the murdered women, his father’s eldest and most loving wife, exclaimed: “Alas, Moalivu! There lies a woman truly unwearied, not only in the day but the night also; the fire consumed the fuel gathered by her hands. If we awoke in the still night, the sound of her feet reached our ears, and if harshly spoken to, she continued to labour only. Moalivu! alas, Moalivu!”

The bodies of the victims were then wrapped up in mats, placed on a bier, and carried out of the door; but the old king was borne through a gap purposely made in the wall of the house. On arriving at the seaside, they were deposited in a canoe, the old king reclining on the deck, attended by his wife and the chief priest, who fanned away the insects. The place of sepulture was at Weilangi. There, in a grave lined with mats, were laid as “grass” the murdered women. Upon them was stretched the dying king, who was stripped of his regal ornaments, and completely enveloped in mats. Lastly, the earth was heaped over him, though he was still alive. At the end of the ceremony the new king returned to his “palace,” not unmindful of the fact that in the course of time a similar fate awaited himself.

Since the annexation of the Fiji Islands, such a scene as this has, of course, become impossible. Cannibalism, to which the Fijians were largely addicted, has also, been prohibited. Lord George Campbell, in his “Log of the Challenger,” written in 1876, says that those who lived in the interior still cherished cannibalistic tendencies, and he seems to have been of opinion that cannibalism prevailed in those parts to which missionaries or civilisation had not yet penetrated. But under the firm rule of Sir Arthur Gordon it was doubtless extirpated.

Even in Lord George Campbell’s time the change effected by the sacred influence of Christianity had been “great indeed.” A party of English officers made a boat-excursion to the large island of Bau, where the king lived. They found him dressed in a waist-cloth, lying on his face in a hut, reading the Bible. Not far distant were the great stones against which they used to kill the sacrificial victims, battering their heads against them till dead. There too they saw a great religious “maki-maki,” hundreds of men and women dancing, and singing New Testament verses before Wesleyan missionaries, who, sitting at a table, received the money-offerings of their converts as they defiled before them dancing and singing.

We have sketched a hideous scene belonging to the past, and associated with the darkest superstitions of the Fijians. We shall adapt from Lord George Campbell a more pleasing picture, in which the past mingles with the present, and the old and the new are not unhappily blended.

The chronicler of the cruise of the “Challenger” was witness of a native dance or “maki-maki,” given at Kandavu in honour of the English officers. When he landed the first “set” had already begun, and torches, consisting of bundles of palm branches tied together, threw a lurid light over the savage scene. On a strip of grass in front of the huts were gathered the dancers, and close around grouped picturesquely on the top of great piles of cocoa-nuts, or squatting on the ground, were the natives of Kandavu and the neighbouring villages, officiating as critics, but prepared in their turn to take part in the wild revelry.

“Glorious Rembrandt effects, as the torches’ flames leapt and fell in the still night air, bathing with ruddy glow that strange scene around,—the semi-nude dusky natives chattering, laughing, glistening eyes and white gleaming teeth, on the reed-built huts, on the foliage above, and flushing redly up the white trunks of the cocoa-palms. Round a standing group of tawny-hued boys and girls who formed the band, some two dozen men, dressed in fantastic manner, their faces blackened, and skins shiny with cocoa-nut oil, were dancing. Wound round their waists they wore great rolls of tappa, or white cloth, falling nearly to the knees, and over these, belts fringed with long narrow streamers of brightly coloured stuff—red, yellow, and white, surging and rustling with every movement; on their heads turbans of finely-beaten tappa, transparent and gauzy, piled high in a peak; gaiters of long black seaweed or grass, strung with white beads; anklets and armlets of large bone rings, or of beads worked in patterns; tortoiseshell bracelets and bead necklaces, from which hung in front one great curled boar’s tusk. Some are dressed better than others, but all in the same wild style. Moving slowly in a circle round and round the band, whose clapping and rollicking strain they accompanied by a loud droning kind of chant, at the end of each stave chiming in with the band with a simultaneous shout, a sudden swaying of the body, a loud hollow clap of the hands, once or twice repeated, and a heavy stamp, stamp of the feet; a moment’s halt and silence, broken plaintively by one of the singers, quickly taken up by the remainder to a clapping, rattling, and vowely measure, and again the dancers circle slowly round, swinging their arms and bodies, clapping, shouting, and droning in faultless time together.”

The first dances were dances of peace; pantomimic representations of the chief pursuits of a Fijian’s life, as, for instance, fishermen hauling in their lines, or the tillers of the field planting tare and gathering in their crops.

Next came the war dances, which reproduced the incidents of the past, incidents never likely to be repeated under British rule. A solitary singer began the strain, and the others gradually joined in,—clappingly, jinglingly, bubblingly, slightly nasally, a strange ring audible throughout, and not less audible the stirring boom of a bamboo drum. Suddenly, from out the surrounding gloom, against which in strong contrast stood the white stems of the cocoa-trees, and into the red light of the torches, merged slowly one after another, in Indian file, a string of “mad, savage-looking devils.” Crouching and bounding, now backwards, now forwards, from side to side, they gradually approached. Their hands carried great clubs, the tips of which were decked with white plumes of silvery “reva-reva,” flashing whitely as they were whirled around; their fantastic finery rustling loudly with every wild movement, eyeballs glaring out from blackened faces, their motions sudden and simultaneous, their splendid stalwart forms swelling with muscles and shining with oil,—they looked “awfully savage and fine;” and to a captive bound and about to be eaten, one would imagine well that the whole performance would be thoroughly enjoyable.

“Now stealthily working their arms and clubs, as if feeling their victim, then with a shout bounding forward, brandishing aloft their clubs, suddenly, as if struck by some unseen hand, falling to the ground on bended knee, swaying first to the right, then to the left, and bringing their clubs down with an ominous thud; again leaping up, bounding back, from side to side, then to the right-about, and all over the place; it is impossible for me to attempt describing them, so I won’t. They were, I suppose, braining enemies by the dozen, and as they worked themselves into mad excitement, so the more they bounded, smashed their enemies’ heads, and were happy. Their drilling was admirable; standing in line with the string, every club whirled as one, every bound and frantic motion went together, and we are told they make fine soldiers, as far as drill is concerned, from this idea of time that they have. In their dances they were led by a small boy—a chief’s son, this function being their prerogative,—a lithe tawny little savage, with a great mop of frizzled yellow hair, and his face dabbed with charcoal. In his hands he carried an enormous palm-leaf fan, with which he directed the dancers. Going through all the movements of the dance, he at the same time careered over the ground, now shouting loud words of command to the singers, and now to the dancers, yards away on their flanks. He was simply splendid, flying about like a demented demon, here, there, and everywhere, the dancers, whether their backs were turned or not, all keeping exact time with him. As these men appeared, so, slowly, still bounding voicelessly, terrifically about, and whirling their clubs, they vanished into the darkness.”

Out of darkness cometh light, and a future, irradiated by the light of Christianity, succeeds to the ghastly past of Fiji, with all its cruel and odious superstitions.

Note on the Polynesian Islands.

Exorcism.

When Captain Moresby, of H.M.S. Basilisk, visited Shepherd Isle, near the Torres group, he found himself compelled to submit to a curious process of exorcism before he was permitted to land.

A “devil-man,” fantastically painted, and adorned with leaves and flowers, waded out to meet his boat, waving a bunch of palm leaves round his head, and as the captain jumped on shore, the devil-man rushed at him, and grasping his right hand, waved the palms round his head in the same manner. It was evident that he meant no harm, and the captain therefore offered no resistance. He placed the leaves in the captain’s right hand and a small twig in his own mouth, and then, as if with a great effort, drew out the twig,—which was supposed to extract the evil spirit,—and blew violently, as if to hurry it away. Afterwards the captain held a twig between his teeth, and the devil-man repeated the process, all the while showing signs of strong excitement.

“He led me then,” says Captain Moresby, “to the edge of the bush, and I began to feel rather reluctant, and doubtful as to how all was going to end, but thought I had better see it out. Here two sticks, ornamented with leaves, were fixed in the ground, and bent to an angle at the top, with leaves tied to the point, and round these sticks the devil-man and I raced in breathless circles till I was perfectly dizzy. He, however, did not seem to mind it at all, and presently flew off with me up a steep path into the bush, where at a short distance we came to two smaller sticks crossed; here he dropped my hand, and taking the bunch of palm leaves from me, waved them, and sprang over the sticks and back again. Then placing both his hands on my shoulders, he leaped with extraordinary agility, bringing his knees to the level of my face at each bound, as if to show that he had conquered the devil, and was now trampling him into the earth. When he had leaped for awhile, he made signs that all was over, and we walked back together to the officers, who had been rather anxiously watching these singular proceedings. The natives, who had kept quietly aloof, now came freely about us, and showed by their manner that they considered us free of the island.”