Chap, xiii.] DANCE AT BURETA. 371 



plaited cocoanut fibre. Many of these were still mounted on 

 their handles^ and are now used by the people who have not 

 parted with them, for cracking nuts. For an exactly similar 

 adze I had paid six shillings in Levuka, and clubs which here 

 were to be bought for a shilling, cost a dollar on the other side 

 of the ridge. It is wonderful how little knowledge has pene- 

 trated as yet from Levuka to Bureta, so short a distance off. 

 The natives could not understand a half-crown, nor could they 

 be induced to give four sixpences for a florin. Threepenny- 

 bits they would not take at all. " Sixpenny " and shilling they 

 knew well. The young Mbau chief of course understood these 

 things, and also thoroughly understood the working of my 

 central fire breech-loading gun, he having one of his own at 

 Mbau. Most of the chiefs have good English fowling-pieces 

 and rifles. 



After a long delay, and constant promises of a commencement, 

 the dance was begun in a flat oblong open space in the village, 

 which had a raised bank on two sides of it, on which the spec- 

 tators assembled. As it got dark, bunches of reeds were lighted 

 and held around by girls to light up the dance, for the moon did 

 not rise till late. 



Only the young men, all visitors at Livoni, and belonging to 

 the army, danced. We waited on, hour after hour, for the girls 

 to commence, but they took so long in decorating themselves 

 and getting ready, that after fours hours' delay we were obliged 

 to leave in a canoe which we hired for a dollar to make the 

 journey to Levuka by sea. 



We had no sooner left than the girls commenced dancing, 

 and they probably waited for us to leave. I saw afterwards 

 in Viti Levu the same dance as that performed by the young 

 men, many of the performers even being the same. I will 

 therefore describe it further on. 



We started in the canoe in the tidal part of the Livoni River 

 at about 10 p.m., and as it was low tide, and there was no 

 wind, the canoe had to be poled the whole way down the river, 

 and along the shore, except for short stretches, where deep 

 water compelled the men to paddle. We had imagined that 

 we had only five miles or so to go, but found that the river on 

 which we were came out on the coast of Ovalau, beyond the end 

 of the adjacent island of Moturiki, or almost at the very opposite 

 side of Ovalau from Levuka. We stretched ourselves on the 

 small outrigger platform on the canoe, but the motion was too 

 irregular and the bed too unsteady to allow of much sleep. It 

 was not till half-past 4 a.m., that we reached Lieut. Suckling's 

 schooner. 



At 6 A.M., on the same day, July .^ist, I started on a cruise 



