Ailments and Remedies.

All serious ailments occurring up to certain ages, and except in certain cases, are generally assumed to be the work of someone acting in connection with a spirit; but, speaking generally, no efforts appear to be made by imprecation or other supernatural method to propitiate or contend against these spirits, except by the use of general charms against illness, and except, so far as the propitiation or driving out of the spirit is involved, by one or other of the specific remedies for specific ailments mentioned below. The natives have, however, for common diseases cures of which some are obviously purely fanciful and superstitious, but some are probably more or less practical.

The chief ailments are colds and complications arising from them, malaria, dysentery, stomach and bowel and similar complaints, toothache and wounds.

Dysentery has recognised and accredited curers, both men and women. The operator chews and crushes with his teeth the root of a vegetable (I do not know what it is) which they grow in their gardens, and then wraps it up into a small bundle in a bunch of grass, and gives it to the patient to suck. This remedy does not appear to be effective.

There are men who are specially skilled in dealing with stomach and bowel troubles. The operator takes in his hand a stone, and with the other hand he sprinkles that stone over with ashes. He then makes over it an incantation, in which, though his lips are seen to be moving, no sound comes out of them; after which he takes some of the ashes from the stone, which he still holds in his hand, and with these ashes he rubs the stomach of the patient, who, I was told, generally at once feels rather better, or says so.

There are also women who deal with cases believed to be caused by the presence in the stomach of a snake, which has to be got out. Here the operator takes a piece of bark cloth, with which she rubs the front of the patient’s body, but without any incantation. Then, as she removes the cloth from the body, she makes a movement as though she were wrapping up in it something, presumably the escaped snake; and afterwards she carries the cloth away with her, and the cure is thus effected.

A man with toothache will say that “a spirit is eating my teeth.” The people seem to have a knowledge of something inside the teeth, the nature of which I am not able to state definitely, but which apparently is, in fact, the nerve, and they recognise that it is in this something that the pain arises; but I could not ascertain the connection between this something and the spirit which is supposed to cause the trouble. If the aching tooth can be got at, they adopt a method the native explanation of which was translated to me as being a drawing or driving out of the mysterious something from the tooth. This is done in some way with an ordinary native comb, without extracting the tooth itself; but how it is done I could not ascertain. There is no incantation connected with the operation. Another cure is for the patient to chew the leaf of a certain tree (I do not know what tree), so that the sap of it gets into the hole in the tooth, and thereby, as they think, draws or drives out this nerve, or whatever the something may be. The Fathers of the Mission told me that both these two remedies do really appear to be effective.

Wounds are the speciality of many healers with special knowledge of the curative properties of various plants, and who gather the plant, make an incantation over it, boil it in water, and then with that water wash the wound. There are also men who operate surgically on wounds with knives made of stone or shell or bamboo.

Charms, probably of a poisonous nature, are used generally for the warding off of sickness, these being carried in the little charm bags.

A general and universal cure for all ailments is a piece of bark, tied with a piece of string to the neck or head, all neck ornaments having been first removed.

I regret that as regards all these matters I am only able to indicate shortly and generally the methods of cure, and can give no further explanation concerning them.

Death and Burial.

(Ordinary People.)

When a man or woman is regarded as dying, he or she is at once attended by a woman whose permanent office it is to do this, and who has other women and girls with her to assist her, these others including, but not necessarily being confined to, the females of the dying man’s own family and relatives. The house is full of women; but there is no man there. This special woman and the others attend the dying man,1 nursing him, washing him from time to time, and keeping the flies away from him; but they apparently do not attempt any measures for curing him, their offices only beginning when he is regarded as dying. In the meantime they all wail, and there are also a number of other women wailing outside the house.

The special woman watches the dying person; and when she thinks he is dead she gives him a heavy blow on the side of the head with her fist, and pronounces him dead. She apparently does not feel his heart, or do more than watch his face; and I should think it may often be that in point of fact he is not dead when the blow is given, and might perhaps have recovered.

Then the women inside the house say to one another that he is dead, and communicate the news to the people outside; whereupon the men in the village all commence shouting as loudly as they can. The reason given for this shouting is that it frightens away the man’s ghost; but if so it is apparently only a partial intimidation of the ghost, who, as will be seen hereafter, is subjected to further alarms at a later stage. The men communicate the news in the ordinary way adopted by these people of shouting it across the valleys; and so it spreads to other villages, and even to other communities. The man being dead, the wailing of the women inside and outside the house is changed into a true funeral wailing song; but this latter only continues for a few minutes. The special woman and some others, probably relatives only, remain in the house; but they do not touch the body at this stage. The other women, probably non-relatives, go out. The relatives of the deceased, both men and women, immediately smear their bodies with mud, but no one else in the village does so.

This is the situation until the first party of women, generally accompanied by men, begin to come in from other villages of the same, and probably of one or more other, communities. These people have been laughing and playing and enjoying themselves on their way to the village, and do so freely until they get close to it. Then they commence wailing (not the funeral song) and shouting, calling the deceased by a relationship term, such as father, brother, etc., though they may never have heard of him before; and, doing this, they enter the village, and go to the house. The incoming women, but not the men, all arrive smeared with mud. The women crowd into and about the house, still wailing as before, but not the funeral song. They all see the body; and each woman, after seeing it, comes out and sits on the platform of the house or on the ground outside. The party of outside village women then cease their first wailing, and commence the funeral song, in which they are joined by the female relatives of the deceased and other women of the village. But again this only lasts for a few minutes, the period being longer or shorter according to the importance of the person who has died.

Other similar parties, coming in from other villages, go through the same performance as they come into the village; and in each case, as the women of each fresh party come out of the house after seeing the corpse, there is a fresh outburst of the funeral song on the part of all the women present, but always only for a few minutes. This goes on till the last batch of visitors has arrived. The people of the village know when this last batch has come, because they have been told by cross-valley shouting which villages are sending parties. The total number of women in the village is then generally very large. After the last batch of visitors has arrived, and until the funeral ceremony, all the women again break out into the funeral song for a few minutes about once an hour in the daytime, but not so often at night.

The funeral takes place probably about twenty-four hours after death. The body is now wrapped up by the special woman attendant, helped by the female relatives of the deceased, in leaves, especially banana leaves, and bark of trees, and remains so wrapped up in the house.

It is placed with the knees bent up to the chin, and the heels to the buttocks. In the meantime men of the village dig a grave 2 or 3 feet deep in the village open enclosure. When all is ready the funeral song begins again, the singers this time being the female relatives of the deceased and the women who have come from outside villages, but not the other women of the village of the deceased. Men of the village then carry the corpse, wrapped and doubled up, and place it, lying on its back, in the grave. There is no real procession from the house to the grave, though all the people assemble at the latter; but during the whole of the time, until the body is in the grave, the singing by the women of the funeral song continues. As soon as the body is in the grave, all the men, both villagers and visitors, shout again as before, and for the same purpose. The grave is then filled up, the women in the meantime singing as before; and when this is done the funeral is over.

The relatives of the deceased now go into mourning. The widow or widower or other nearest relative wears the mourning string necklace already described. He or she, and also the other near relatives, smear their faces, and sometimes, but not always, their bodies, with black, to which, as regards the face, but not the body, is added oil or water. Some more distant relatives, instead of blackening themselves, wear the mourning shell necklace. And all this will continue, nominally without break, until the mourning is formally removed, in the way to be explained hereafter. As a matter of fact, the insignia of mourning are not worn without interruption, and the black smearing is by no means so retained; but on any special occasion the person would take care to appear in mourning. There is a custom under which the widow or widower or other nearest relative may, instead of wearing the mourning string necklace, abstain during the period of mourning from eating some particular food, of which deceased was most fond.2

In connection with mourning, I should also mention a curious custom, which I understand is common, though not universal, for a woman who has lost a child, and especially a first-born or very clear child, to amputate the top end of one of her fingers, up to the first joint, with an adze. Having done this once for one child, she will possibly do it again for another child; and a woman has been seen with three fingers mutilated in this way.3

The family of the deceased invite men and women from some other community, but only one community, to a funeral feast, which is held after an interval of two or three days from the day of the funeral. On the day appointed these guests arrive. They are all well ornamented, but, with one exception, they do not wear their dancing ornaments. One of them, however, usually a chief or the son of a chief of the community invited, comes in his full dancing ornaments. All the guest men bring with them their spears, and perhaps adzes or clubs.

When they arrive the following performances take place, the village enclosure being left by the villagers empty and open:—First two guest women enter the village enclosure at one end, and run in silence round it, brandishing spears in both hands, as at the big feast; but they make no hostile demonstration. When these two women have reached their starting point, they again do the same thing, brandishing their spears as before, and all the guest men, except the specially dressed one, follow them by advancing with a dancing step along the enclosure, they also brandishing their spears, and also being silent. Thus the whole group goes to the other end of the village, passing the grave of the deceased as they do so; then they turn round, and come back again in the same way, but on their return they stop before they reach the grave.

Then the specially ornamented guest man enters alone, without his arms, but with his drum, which he beats. He dances up the village enclosure in a zigzag course, going from side to side of the enclosure, and always facing in the direction in which he is at the time moving; and during his advance he beats his drum., but otherwise he and all the other people are silent. When in this way he has reached the grave, the chief of the clan of the village where the funeral takes place, who does not wear any dancing ornaments, approaches him, and removes his heavy head ornament. This ends the first part of the ceremony; and the villagers and guests then chat and conduct themselves in the ordinary way.

Plates 82 and 83 illustrate scenes at a funeral feast in the village of Amalala. In the former plate the grave is very clear, and the remains of an older grave are visible behind the post a little to the left. At the upper end of the village enclosure are the visitors, who are about to dance along the enclosure past the grave, and then back again up to it. The figures in the emone behind are Amalala men, watching the performance. In the latter plate the visitor chief is seen dancing along the village enclosure towards the grave.

In the meantime the members of the family of the deceased bring in one or more village pigs and some vegetables. A number of sticks are laid upon the ground over the grave, the sticks crossing each other so as to form a rude ground platform (this is not done by any particular person), and these sticks are covered with banana leaves.4 The pigs are placed on this platform, and are then killed by the pig-killer and cut up, and the vegetables and pieces of pig are distributed by the chief of the clan, helped perhaps by the family of the deceased, among the male visitors. The one specially dressed visitor, being the only one who has really danced, gets much the largest share. For example, if there be two or more pigs, he will get an entire pig for himself. Then the ceremony is over, and the guests return home. The wood of the platform is not removed from the grave, but is left to rot there. The killing of the pigs at this ceremony is regarded as the act which will, they think, finally propitiate or drive away the ghost of the departed.

It will be noticed that, though representatives from several communities may be invited and come to the funeral, only one community is invited to the subsequent funeral feast, just as only one community is invited to the big feast, which latter we must, I think, associate with the general superstitious idea of laying the ghosts of past departed chiefs and notables. I cannot say what is the reason for the confinement of these invitations to one community only, but it must, I think, have had some definite origin5; and as to this I am struck by the similarity of the Massim idea, referred to by Dr. Seligmann, that an individual’s death primarily concerns the dead man’s hamlet and one other hamlet of his clan, with which certain death feasts are exchanged, other members of the clan being comparatively little affected.6

As soon as possible after the funeral pig-killing, they catch some wild pig or pigs, and kill and eat them, and sweep down the village by way of purification ceremony, very much as they do in the case of the big feast, except that it is on a very much smaller scale, and that the people do not afterwards leave the village.

The ceremony of removal of the mourning may take place after an interval of only a week or two, or of so much as six months, the date often depending upon the occurrence of some other ceremony, at which the removal of the mourning can be carried out without necessitating a ceremony for itself only. Visitors from some other community attend. The ceremony only applies to the nearest relative—the person who wears the string necklace; but, on his or her mourning being ceremoniously removed, the mourning of all others in respect of the same deceased ceases automatically.7 This nearest relative has to provide a village pig. There is a feast, and dancing and pig-killing and distribution of food and pig, in the usual way, and this may be in the village of the deceased or in some other village of the community. The pig-killing is done by the pig-killer under the platform of a chiefs platform grave, or on the site of it. The pig, specially provided by the nearest relative, is bought and paid for by some person, as in the case of some of the ceremonies already described, and this person, after the killing of the pig, without special ceremony, cuts off the mourner’s string necklace, dips it in the blood of the pig, and throws it away; then he takes some coloured paint, usually red, and with it daubs two lines on each side of the face across the cheek of the mourner, who of course at this ceremony will still have his black paint. If the mourner has been refraining from food, instead of wearing the necklace, the ceremony is confined to the paint-daubing. Then the mourner pays this ceremonial pig-buyer for his services, probably in feathers or dog-teeth, and the mourning is at an end.

There will at a later date be a purification ceremony, at which wild pigs will be killed, such as has already been described.8

Death and Burial.

(Chiefs.)

A dying chief is attended by the special woman and others in the way above described, except that many women of the clan are there, and that this special attendance and its accompanying wailing begin earlier, perhaps two or three days earlier, than in the case of an ordinary person, and that all the women of the clan who are not in the house wail outside it.

In this case, however, there is a special ceremony for ascertaining whether or not the chief is in fact going to die—a ceremony which is usually performed at his own request. Some vegetable food, probably sweet potato, or perhaps sugar-cane or taro, is given him to eat; and this he will do although he may be very ill, and may not have been taking food, though of course, if he were insensible or unable to eat, this special ceremony could not be carried out. The inedible portions of this food, e.g., the peel of the potato or the hard fibres of the sugar-cane, are then handed to certain magical persons of the community, whose special duty it is to perform the ceremony about to be described, but as to whom I was unable to ascertain who and what they are, and whether they have any other special functions besides those of this ceremony. Some of these portions of food may even be sent to some similar magic person of high reputation in another community, in order that he also may perform the same ceremony. Each of these magic persons also has handed to him a portion of a perineal band belonging to, and recently worn by, the ailing chief.

Each of the magic men then wraps up the portion of food which has been given to him in the piece of band; and this he again wraps up in leaves, and continues doing so until the parcel has become a round ball 4 or 5 inches in diameter. The men then separate, and each of them goes off alone to a spot outside the village, where he collects some very dry firewood, and heaps it up against the trunk of a tree to a height of, say, 6 feet. He then engages in an incantation, after which he puts the ball inside the bottom of the wood pile, and lights the pile at the bottom. Then he lies down by this fire and closes his eyes. After an interval of perhaps two to five minutes he gets up, as though awakening from a bad dream, and hears the wailing in the adjoining village, and asks himself what all this wailing is about; and he then appears to remember for what purpose he is there, goes to the fire, and takes out the ball. If the fire has burnt or scorched the food wrapped up in the ball, it is an indication that the chief is to die. If not, it indicates that he will live. These magic men then return to the village, and report the result. If their report be that the chief is going to live, the people cease their wailing, but if it be that he is to die, the wailing continues.

Pausing here for a moment, I may admit that, though I have told the tale of this ceremony, with its private cogitations—real or pretended—of the magic men, as it was told to me, the tale is open to obvious questions. How can a magic man from a distant community hear the wailing? What would happen if the results of the ceremonies of the various magic men were to differ? What would be the situation if a chief whose death was indicated by the ceremony lived, or if one whose recovery was foretold became worse and died? All these points I tried to elucidate without success; but possibly the answer to the query as to divergence of results may be that the men take care that the results of their experiments shall not differ.

It is believed by the natives that, if a hostile community can secure some of the food remnants and band, and hand them to their own magic man, for him to go through the same ceremony, he may maliciously bring about an unfavourable result, and thus may cause the death of the chief. If the belief that such a thing had happened arose, it would be a casus belli with that other community; and a case is known in which an inter-community fight did occur on this ground.

If the report be that the chief is to die, the special woman attendant will give him the blow on the head, as in the case of the ordinary villager. The shouting of the men outside when the chiefs death is announced is much louder than in the case of a commoner; and as they shout they brandish their spears, and strike the roof of the chiefs house with the spear points, and some of the men strike it with adzes and clubs. The spreading of the news to other communities is on a wider scale, and the number of people who respond to the news and come to the funeral is very great, and includes a larger number of chiefs and prominent men; there are more, and much larger, parties of them. The funeral song of the women, commenced on the announcement of death, lasts much longer—indeed for hours. In fact, as numerous large bodies of people keep coming in, and some of these coming from a distance may not arrive until just before the funeral, and as the funeral song has to be recommenced as each fresh party comes in, and lasts so much longer each time, it follows that this funeral song practically continues without ceasing from the moment when death is announced until the actual funeral. The immediate smearing by men and women of their bodies with mud is done by all the members of the entire community. When the guests reach the village, they are all, both men and women, smeared with mud, and they loudly call on the dead chief by his title amidi, or as babe (father). Also the various chiefs’ wives among the guests remain in the house after seeing the body, instead of coming out with the other guest women.

The funeral does not take place till thirty-six or forty-eight hours after the death. The various chiefs’ wives take part in the wrapping up of the body; and to the ordinary wrappings are added large pieces of bark cloth.

The grave9 is quite different from that of a commoner. There are two methods of sepulture adopted for chiefs, the grave being in both cases in or by the edge of the open village enclosure.

The first of these methods is a burial platform, a very rough erection of upright poles from 9 to 12 feet high, the number of which may be four, or less or more than that, at the top of which erection is a rude wooden box-shaped receptacle, about 2 or 3 feet square, and from 6 inches to a foot deep, and uncovered at the top, in which receptacle the corpse is placed. Sometimes the supporting structure, instead of being composed of a number of poles, is only a rough tree trunk, on which the lower ends of the branches are left to support the box.

The second method is tree burial. The tree in which this is done is a special form of fig tree called gabi, the burial box, similar to the one above described, being placed in its lowest fork, or, if that be already occupied, then in the next one, and so on.10 A tree has been seen with six of these boxes in it, one above another. This tree is specially used for such burials. The natives will never cut it down. In selecting a village site they will often specially choose one where one of these trees is growing; and indeed the presence of such a tree in the bush raises a probability that there is, or has been, a native village there.11

If a burial platform afterwards falls down through decay, the people throw away all the bones, except the skull and the larger bones of the arms and legs; and these they deal with in one of three alternative ways. They either (1) dig a shallow grave in the ground under the fallen platform, and put the skull and special bones there, and then fill in the grave with soil, on this put a heap of stones, and on these put the wooden remains of the collapsed platform, planting round them tobacco or croton, or some other fine-leaved plant, or (2) they put the skull and special bones in a box on the gabi burying tree, or (3) they take them to the emone, and there hang them up till they are wanted for a big feast. In the same way, if a tree box falls, they retain only the skull and large arm and leg bones, and replace them in a new box in the same tree.

We have already seen a chiefs burial platform in the two plates 69 and 70 relating to the big feast at Seluku, and the following plates are additional illustrations:—Plate 84 is the grave of a chiefs child in the village of Malala. The supports of the grave rise from the village enclosure fence behind, and are quite distinct from the underground commoner’s grave, which is seen in front. The positions of the two graves can be seen in the general view of the village (Plate 58). Plate 85 is a group of graves of chiefs and chiefs’ relatives in the village of Tullalave (community of Auga). Plate 86 shows the grave of a chiefs child in the village of Faribe (community of Faribe). The form of this grave is quite different from those of the others, and is not, I think, so common, but a grave somewhat resembling it is seen in Plate 60.

Plate 87 is a gabi fig tree, used for tree burial, near to the village of Seluku, and Plate 88 shows the remains of an old burial box in one of its forks. The bones are still in this box, and indeed one of them may be just discerned at the extreme left, close to the upright stem of the tree.

Plate 89 illustrates what I have said as to what is done when a burial platform falls down from decay. The skull and larger arm and leg bones of the body have been buried underground, and upon these have been heaped first stones and then the remains of the collapsed platform, and one little foliage plant and dried-up looking specimens of others can be seen around it. This picture was taken in the village of Seluku, and the actual position of the grave in the village enclosure is seen in Plate 55. Plate 90, of an emone in the village of Voitele (community of Sivu) illustrates the alternative plan of hanging the skull and bones up in the emone.

At the funeral all the women present, those of the village and of the whole community and the guests, join in singing the funeral song; but here again there is no actual procession, and the carrying of the body is not necessarily entrusted to any particular person. When the grave, whether on a platform or on a tree, is reached, all the men present begin to shout loudly, and there is a terrible noise. They all have their spears, but there is no brandishing of them. Then some men (anyone may do this) climb up to the box, and others hand the wrapped body up to them, and they place it lying on its back in the box. This ends the actual burial ceremony.

The black mourning face, and sometimes body-staining is then adopted by all the people of the community, and perhaps also by chiefs from other communities who have been friends of the dead chief. The special string necklace worn by the nearest relative and the other family emblems of mourning are the same as in the case of an ordinary person, except that the chiefs widow will probably also wear the special mourning network vest already described, and that the mourning shell necklace, which in the case of an ordinary man is only worn by distant relatives, is worn by all the married men and women of the clan who have or can procure it.

The subsequent ceremony and feast are in this case held one or two days after the funeral, the acceleration in the case of a chief being necessary in consequence of the retention of the corpse above ground and the foul smell which immediately begins to emanate from it. This feast is on a very large scale, though here again only one community is invited. The guests enter the village just as they do in the case of the death of an ordinary person; but they are all specially well decorated, and the one guest who comes in full dancing ornaments will certainly be a chief, or at least a chiefs son. The subsequent part of the ceremony, up to the removal of the head feather ornament from the dancer, is the same; but this removal is done by the nearest male relative of the deceased chief, who will probably be the person to whom the chieftainship has descended. Then follows the feast itself. The vegetables and village pigs for the feast are provided by the whole clan, and are in very large quantities. No platform of sticks is placed on the grave, the grave in this case not being underground; but the banana leaves are placed around (not under) the supports of the burial platform, or around the trunk of the burial tree. The pigs are killed upon these banana leaves by the pig-killer and his helpers, and the killed pigs are then placed in circles around the platform or tree, and are there cut up. The distribution of food and pig’s flesh is made by the chiefs nearest male relative, with assistance, here again the special dancer getting the largest share, and the ceremony is then over, and the guests return to their villages.

And now a true desertion of the village by its inhabitants takes place, as indeed is necessary, as the putrefying body is becoming so offensive; and it will be at least two or three weeks before the emission of the smells is over. The villagers all go off into the bush, with the exception of two unhappy men, more or less close relatives of the dead chief, who have to remain in the village. Whilst there alone they are well ornamented, though not in their full dancing decoration, but in particular, though not themselves chiefs, they wear on their heads the cassowary feathers which are the distinctive decoration of a chief, and they carry their spears. There they remain amidst the awful stench of the decomposing body and all the mess and smell of the pigs’ blood and garbage about the village. It is a curious fact that, in speaking of these two men, the natives do not speak of them as watching over the body of the chief, but as watching over the blood of the killed pigs.

When the stench is over, the villagers in the bush are informed, and they then return to the village. Then follow the killing and eating of wild pigs and sweeping down of the village, as in the case of the death of an ordinary person, but again on a much larger scale.

It will be noticed that, though the desertion of the village after a big feast lasts for six months, that which follows a chiefs funeral only lasts for a few weeks.

The removal of the mourning takes place after an interval which may be anything between one and six months. This is a special ceremony, and will not be postponed for the purpose of tacking it on to some other ceremony, as in the case of an ordinary person’s mourning removal; but other ceremonies will often be tacked on to it. The guests invited are from only one other community. Here again the person actually dealt with is the chief mourner, and the removal of mourning from him or her terminates the mourning for everyone. The village pigs for this occasion are provided by the dead man’s family, and not by the whole clan, as in the case of a chiefs funeral feast. There will probably be two or three of such pigs provided; but, as the ceremony is also available for various other ceremonies, there may be a considerable number of pigs killed. The dancing and pig-killing and feast are the same as those of an ordinary mourning-removal ceremony, but on a larger scale. The pig-killing in this case is done round the platform or tree on which the chief is buried. The buyer of the pig, who cuts off the mourning necklace and daubs the face of the chief mourner, if not a chief, will at all events be a person of importance; but the ceremonies relating to all these matters are identical with those already described. There is also the subsequent purification ceremony, at which wild pigs are killed and eaten as before.

The graves of chiefs’ wives and members of their families, and other persons of special importance, are platform or tree graves, like those of chiefs, and the funeral ceremonies on the deaths of these people are very similar to those of chiefs, though they are on a scale which is smaller, in proportion to the relative smallness of the importance of the person to be buried; and they are subject to a few detailed differences, which the difference of the situation involves. The special magic ceremony for ascertaining if the patient is or is not going to die is not performed in the case of these people.