MAHFOLE OR HELMETS. 



II 



y^RED 



YELLOW 



:iV:;:t: v.vG R E E N ^^tn^^lvn^;* 



COLOR SCHEME. 



a little smaller than the Vancouver specimen (15.5 inches from base to tip), but the 

 measurements may have been taken in a dii^erent manner. The angular ear notch is 

 the same, and the number and arrangement of the radiating arms is duplicated. It 

 seems as if one skilful workman made both of these mahiole. 



40. One of the four is covered with feathers and is a most interesting specimen. 

 In general shape it resembles the last, but has six instead of five arms. It is 19 inches 

 from base to tip (a-b), and as shown in the color diagram, Fig. 10, i., has a red body or 

 cup fringed on the front edge with interrupted black 

 lines; three arms are yellow and three red, and the crest 

 is red beneath, yellow above. In this, as in some others, 

 the two methods of attaching the feathers are used. The 

 ra^'S and crest are covered with feather-bearing network, 

 while the cup is composed of rods to which feathers are 

 bound, a structure more solid and useful as a helmet. 



41. In the same figure No. 11. shows a helmet of the more common shape, 15 

 inches from A to h, and covered with red, black and yellow feathers. Certainly this 

 collection shows some of the most interesting forms of the Hawaiian feather lielmets, 



and the close religious and commercial connection 

 of Boston with the Hawaiian Kingdom explains 

 the presence of such good specimens. 



It is unfortunate that there are no specimens 

 extant of the helmets of the southern groups. 

 The fanatical revulsion from paganism caused the 

 voluntary destruction of these as well as the idols, 

 and if any were preserved by stealth, as I have 

 information that the idols Avere in some cases, time 

 Pi^"'- 7- has probaljly destro3'ed the more delicate fabric. 



At the marriage of Aimata and Pomare in Tahiti, in 1S21, Reverend William Ellis 

 writes that "The two principal Raaliras were distinguished bv their ancient helmets, 

 superbly covered with red feathers, and surmounted with the tails of tropic-birds. "^ 

 The conical cap of the Easter Islanders, covered with feathers of the barnyard fowl, is 

 perhaps the degenerate remains of a feather helmet. 



Marquesan Head Dress. — The Bishop Museum lias just received from our 

 collector, Mr. Alvin Scale, who has been for the past year in the southeast Pacific, a 

 very interesting feather head dress, Pac kiia, obtained from an old chief at Nukuhiva, 

 the principal island of the Marquesas. It is a broad band of lenticular outline com- 

 posed of the fibrous sheath of the leaf of the coco palm bound with a neat braid of 

 Pandanus. The feathers are attached in a peculiar way by long fibres fastened verti- 

 cally to the long axis of the band. As there is no net or any very firm substratum to 



5 I^etter quoted in Tyet man ami Hennet, ii., 1,57. L445 J 



