Fulton. — On the Fiji Fire-walking Ceremony. 189 



owing to the distraction of attention by the " staging effects," 

 had undoubtedly cooled. They had changed from white to 

 red, and then to grey, and finally to black. This stirring-up 

 process, yelling, heaving, hauling, &c, took over an hour, 

 possibly nearer two, and was continued till every little piece 

 of smoking wood was removed. Before the levelling I had 

 rushed forward to within oft. of the fire, and again after the 

 levelling I tried the heat and found it diminishing ; however, 

 at the centre of the oven it must still have been very great. 



At last, everything being ready, we were requested to 

 keep perfect silence, as the fire-walkers were coming. There 

 was no chanting or singing, or anything to suggest that it 

 was in any way a religious ceremony. One of the performers 

 first appeared alone, and, coming into the circle, Dr. Smith, 

 of Dunedin, and myself were given an opportunity of making 

 a scientific examination of him before the actual " walk " 

 took place. He was a fine big fellow, about 5 ft. 9 in. in 

 height, and was quite willing to be examined and overhauled. 

 His pulse was a little over 90, his hands were cool, and his 

 feet cold, most perceptibly colder than the rest of the body. 

 There was no preparation to be detected on the feet, and they 

 were perfectly clean and odourless. I did not test them by 

 the sense of taste as I had the assurance of Dr. Hocken that 

 there was nothing to be noticed in that somewhat heroic 

 method of examination. The soles of the feet were yellowish- 

 white, and perfectly smooth and pliable, like soft kid. The 

 man wore a sulu of dry Hibiscus bark and Ganna leaves, and 

 small anklets of dry bracken, exactly the same as our Pterts 

 aquilina. There were innumerable little black hairs on the 

 legs, and these we closely examined. Having notified the 

 director of ceremonies, Mr. Duncan, that we had finished 

 our examination, he made a sign and the " walker " dis- 

 appeared. Breathless with excitement, and in expectation of 

 we knew not what, we awaited the arrival of the descendants 

 of Tui Ngalita (Tui Qalita). 



Now in dead silence on our part, but amid exclamations 

 of astonishment from the onlooking natives, the mystic band 

 of about a dozen men appeared from the depths of the cocoa- 

 nut grove, and, passing through a little gap in our circle, 

 walked deliberately across and twice around the heated 

 stones Looking back on it now it seems like a strange 

 dream. Above and around us are the beautiful feathery 

 fronds of the cocoanut and palm trees meeting overhead and 

 almost shutting out the blue sky. Here a huge ivi-tree, with 

 its lovely dark-green leaves and curiously buttressed stem, 

 serves as a vantage from which half a score of black faces 

 and frizzled heads peer down. From a tree on this side a 

 great spider, with its 2 in. long tortoise-shell-coloured legs 





