BY THE REV. J. GOLDIE. 29 



infanticide, which obtains in the Eastern part of the 

 Solomons. 



The burial customs, also, are interesting, as indicating 

 some of the religious beliefs of tliese people. The body 

 of a slave is usually buried in the sea, and no further notice 

 taken. When one of their own people dies, however, 

 it is a very different thing. If he is a man of any import- 

 ance, such as a chief, all his people gather togetlier, and a 

 time of great feasting takes place. The body is decked out 

 in all the finery and ornaments which he possessed, with 

 shield and spear and axe, and fixed in a sitting posture 

 it remains in the house for about three days. All the time 

 great wailing and lamentation goes on in the belief that 

 the spirit of the deceased will hear and be pleased. At 

 the end of tliree days, the body is taken away, with great 

 ceremony, and left on one of the small islands used as a 

 burial place. After the flesh has left the bones, another 

 big feast takes place, and with great ceremony the skull 

 of the late chief is brought back and safely deposited in 

 a little head house prepared for it at one of the sacred places 

 near the village. To this place the friends go from time 

 to time, taking offerings of food and ornaments, which they 

 leave at the shrine, and make great lamentations in the 

 belief that they are comforting the spirit of their departed 

 friend. The period of mourning generally lasts for about 

 eighty or one hundred days, and during the whole of that 

 time the relatives of the deceased will not enter a canoe, 

 or, in some instances, leave the house. They will not 

 allow a drop of water to touch their bodies, nor a comb 

 or knife to touch their heads. Their hair grows long, 

 and is generally whitened with lime, and thus they live 

 in filth and discomfort for months* to express their sorrow. 

 The head of a leper, or of a man who has met with a sudden 

 violent death, by accident, they will not bring in for fear 

 that they will meet witli a like fate. On some of the 

 islands in the group, the wives of important persons who 

 die are expected to commit suicide, in order to accompany 

 their lord and master on his last long journey. If they 

 refuse, which they sometimes do, they are strangled by 

 their friends, that the departed one may not be lonely. 

 No one, of course, dies naturally in these islands. When 

 a man dies his friends all believe that he must have been 



C — ROYAIi SOCIBTY. 



