PIGS 133 



means ghosts ; they described niniki as things which 

 you could not see but were here and there in the air 

 about you. When they were asked where a dead man 

 had gone to, they talked of 7tiniki, and pointed vaguely 

 to the horizon, saying the word which means " far." 



If there is one thing in heaven or earth to which it 

 may be said that the Papuans pay some sort of respect . jl 

 it is the pig. They hunt and kill a good many wild . 



pigs in the jungle an d eat their flesh, but the lower r^tj- 

 jaw of each animal is carefully cleaned and hung up 

 on a sort of rack in front of the houses ; on one of 

 these racks I counted no fewer than thirty-two pigs' 

 jaws. The grass and leaves in which the animal is 

 wrapped and the ropes used for tying it up when it is 

 carried home from the jungle, are not thrown away 

 but are hung up on a similar sort of rack in a conspicuous 

 place in the village. 



In every village there may generally be seen two 

 or three pigs running about freely ; they are probably 

 not bred in the village, but are caught in the jungle, i^^^ 

 when they are young. They very soon become quite p i ^ 

 tame and accompany the people on their migrations ^^^^ 

 from one place to another until they are full grown, .^ly^^^ 

 wh:eir''TEe}r" provide food for a festival. The only 

 elaborate popular ceremony that took place while we ^ V 

 were in the country happened early in May at Parimau, 

 and the principal feature of it was the slaughter of pigs. 

 Unfortunately for me I was at the base-camp at the 

 time and did not see the festival, so I will make extracts 

 from Marshall's graphic account.* 



* Standard, 4, 8, 1910. 



