A TIISTOBY OF FIJI 



535 



Verala, wliicli was only eight miles from ]\Ibaii, was then the 

 strongest power in Fiji, dominating the villages for about ten miles 

 along the shore of Viti Levu, but Mbau, aided by this base imitator of 

 Champlain, soon stripped it of its dependencies, leaving to its chief only 

 his native village. Savage caused the natives to construct an arrow- 

 proof sedan chair, wdthin which he remained comfortably seated firing 

 through an opening, and this contrivance was carried into battle while 

 he terrified and slaughtered the impotent enemies of Mbau. For his 

 share of the spoils of conquest Savage demanded women, and he is 

 said to have acquired a hundred wives. N"a-Ulivou heaped honors and 

 titles upon him and gave him for his principal wife a chieftainess of 

 the highest rank, but her children were strangled for reasons of state 

 polity, so that after his death he was survived by but a single daughter. 



For two years Mbau enjoyed a monopoly of firearms in Fiji, and 



Ratu Bem Taxoa and his Wife Aui Cakabau in their House at Xavuso. Viti 

 Levu Island, Fiji, in 1899. They are cousins, both being members of the Royal 

 Family of Fiji. The screen is a large piece of Taviiini tapa. 



