224 THE POLYNESIAN WANDERINGS. 



Maori : roro, id . Tahiti : roro, the brains of mankind . Mangaia : 

 roro, brains. Mangareva : roro, soft, pure milk from the breast 

 or from coconuts, the skull, the head. Paumotu: takaroro, 

 headache. Rapanui: roro, brain, skull. 



Viti: lolo, milk of the coconut squeezed from scraped kernel. 



Arabic : rd'a, to moisten bread with fat. 



In Efate and Nuclear Polynesia we find complete accord upon the par- 

 ticular signification of the word. In the Polynesia of the Tongafiti swarm 

 we find the word identical in form, but in sense in complete accord upon a 

 different signification, to which brain meaning the ultimate migrations have 

 added in Hawaiian and Maori the meaning of marrow. Along the Tonga- 

 fiti track the word for oil is sinu, which appears in Nuclear Polynesia con- 

 currently with lolo, and in the western verge in Ticopia. Now in Nuclear 

 Polynesia the word for brain is derived from the coconut but from another 

 part, the spongy substance (uto) which in an old nut occupies the space 

 where the water has been : Tonga, Uvea, uto ; Niue, uhoniu o he ulu (coconut 

 sponge of the head) : Samoa, uto, the head as a term of abuse, while for brains 

 yet another coconut product is employed, one advanced in manufacture, 

 fai'ai the cooked juice, which in Futuna faikai is restricted to the literal 

 sense. This uto also signifies marrow in Tonga, Uvea, Viti (utoni sui). 



We next pass to the southeastern terminus of all possible migration, 

 Mangareva and the Paumotu. Here we pick up once more the coconut 

 milk in Mangareva roro and find it extended to the human breast. Con- 

 joined with this we find a strange variation from the Tongafiti sense, a 

 passage from the soft parts to the hard, from the contents to the calvaria. 

 Here the word uto means marrow, utuhupoko brains. Altogether a strange 

 fact and remote spot in which to find an inosculation of Proto-Samoan and 

 Tongafiti. Rapanui unites the soft and the hard parts in this word. 



The lolo reappears in such parts of Nuclear Polynesia as have the animal 

 as a component of Samoa palolo, Tonga balolo, Viti mbalolo. I cite a note on 

 this subject which I wrote out for Dr. William McMichael Wood worth, who 

 identified the palolo as the posterior epitokal part of Eunice viridis (Gray) : 



Stair's derivation from pa'a-lolo, luscious crab, is out of all consideration; it is on all 

 fours with the classic definition of a crab as a small red fish that walks backward, for 

 pa' a (paka) could not in the Samoan system of word structure undergo such a syncopa- 

 tion as to cut itself in two. As the bit beastie is in no sense a crab, and I must claim 

 for my islanders that their intelligence is sufficiently high to prevent them from putting 

 two such dissimilar animals together, so in turn is lolo not luscious. The organs of 

 sense perception by which the Samoan apperceives lolo lie, not in the peripheral nerve 

 endings of the tongue, but of the fingers; it is a matter of touch and not of taste such as 

 luscious principally connotes. I got a very instructive glimpse at this word from my 

 cook boy and a dish of vermicelli soup. After it had served my uses the tureen went 

 back to the kitchen. I found the servitor dabbling his fingers in the dish, which he 

 pronounced to be fa'alolo. I regard the primal signification as one of consistency, some- 

 what custardy, a substance partially solid that may to a certain extent be grasped in 

 the fingers yet which seems to slip out and elude the grasp. That, it will be noticed, 

 is a thread that can be run through all the significations. It applies equally to the 

 palolo as you feel it in the water on the great day of its appearance. In the slightly 

 specialized sense of slippery it applies similarly to its other two compounds in the 

 Samoan, ngalolo and umelolo, both being fishes and the latter a variety of Naseus 

 lituratus or unicornis. 



