A HISTORY OF FIJI 3°* 



industrious, bigoted race whom the Fijians despise and with whom they 

 do not mingle. Indeed, there are far more half-breds between the 

 whites and Fijians than between Fijians and Hindoos. 



Although all native arts have suffered and some have wholly dis- 

 appeared in Fiji, the introduction of European methods has been slower 

 in this group than elsewhere in the Pacific. Spears and clubs and 

 other implements of war are no longer made unless, indeed, it be to sell 

 to tourists, and the dancing masks and wigs of former days have dis- 

 appeared, along with the cannibal forks. Once the natives took great 

 pride in their war-clubs, and a man's rank was indicated by the fashion 

 of his club and his manner of carrying it, only chiefs being permitted 

 to bear it over the shoulder as we would a gun. The handle was 

 notched whenever the club had served to kill a man, and such a weapon 

 was called a " ngandro " to distinguish it from common clubs. Indeed 

 the more famous clubs were given individual names, a certain chief be- 

 ing the proud possessor of one called " the giver of rest." Elaborately 

 carved, and built up, spears of iron-wood ten or fifteen feet long were 

 common, and were sometimes tipped with the spine of the sting-ray, 

 which upon breaking within the wound caused certain death. In the 

 distant villages among the mountains of the large islands, spears and 

 clubs were still to be seen in the houses in 1899, but from more acces- 

 sible places they have long since disappeared to crowd the shelves of 

 our museums. Everywhere the natives of the coasts have yielded, and 

 more or less conformed to the white man's customs, but only a few 

 miles inland, isolated by the dense forests or walled in by mountains, 

 they were in 1900 almost as in heathen times. Yet even in these re- 

 mote places the natives are not wholly separated from the world, for 

 news is carried rapidly by word of mouth, and Wilkes speaks of a case 

 in which a message was transmitted 20 miles through a forested country 

 in less than six hours. 



The pursuit of war was once the chief concern of the Fijians, and 

 was often conducted in a very ceremonious fashion. An offended chief 

 thrust sticks into the ground) and removed them only when appeased. 

 If war was determined upon a herald was sent to the village of the 

 enemy to announce the fact. As is universal with primitive people, 

 the mustering of the army was the occasion for much extravagant 

 boasting, and their faces were painted red or half red and half black. 

 Miss Gordon Cumming gives a striking description of the wild war- 

 dance and the boasts of the warriors who assembled at the call of Sir 

 Arthur Gordon to take part in the war against the cannibal tribes of the 

 Singatoka Eiver in the mountains. "This is only a musket" cried 

 one warrior "but I carry it." By contrast the men from Mbau came 

 up in stately fashion, their spokesman saying "This is Mbau, that is 

 enough." 



The towns were often fortified with wooden stockades or stone 



