616 STRAY NOTES ON PAPUAN ETHNOLOGY, 



of disgust. A pretty scene every evening in an Eastern Papuan 

 village is a file of women w^ending their way b}^ the forest path 

 home, each bending under a porha full of fifty or sixty pounds 

 weight of fire-wood or garden produce. The basket is laid across 

 her shoulders somewhat as a North British fisher lass carries her 

 creel of fish, but instead of being slung the porha is caught by the 

 rim in the crook of the porter's fingers. 



Fostscri^H. — Since writing the above I have been favoured by 

 tM^o veteran missionaries and accomplished ethnologists with the 

 following additional information. 



The Rev. Dr. W. Wyatt Gill tells me :— 



" This is the common food-basket throughout the South Pacific 

 Islands, and no doubt it is the same in the North Pacific, too. 

 At Mangaia, it is called ' r a u r a u ' = ' leaflet-leaflet ' (i.e., of the 

 coconut palm). At Rarotonga it is the ' k i k a u.' Now, 

 ' k i k a u ' is the name for the coconut leaf or frond. So although 

 a food basket is made from only a part of a frond, it bears the 

 same name as the whole. There are plenty of parallels to this in 

 our own language, i.e., a ' sail ' for a ' ship,' itc, &c. At Aitutaki, 

 it is called indifferently 'tapora'or'kete.' 'Kete' means 

 basket in general. Mangaia, Rarotonga and Aitutaki are the 

 three chief islands of the Cook's Group. I have seen exactly the 

 same food baskets at Tahiti and each of the Leeward Islands (now 

 French) as far back as 1852. Their name is 'ete' (i.e., the 

 'kete' of the Cook's Group) I believe." 



The Rev. S. Ella writes to me : — " Your drawing of it is a good 

 sketch, only needing the knotting together of the leaflets (pinna}) 

 to form the bottom. It is the commonest kind of basket used, 

 and is easil}' and quickly made, the material, the upper end of a 

 coconut leaf, being always at hand. It is not so remarkable that 

 it should be so generally used throughout Polynesia, and in almost 

 exactly similar form and construction, when one considers its 

 simplicity almost self-suggestive, and the general abundance of 

 the materials; women and children make them with ease. Your 

 description of its construction is correct. It is employed for 



