MELANESIA. 



55 



are getting under way. Their destination was not stated ; but it is 

 presumed to be a " city of spirits," which is said to exist beneath the 

 water, in what is called the Great Channel (Ndaveta-levu), between 

 Moturiki and Mbau. It is governed by a god called Tui-Ndaveta- 

 levu. When the natives pass through this channel, they take off 

 their turbans (sala) in token of reverence, and scrupulously avoid 

 throwing any filth into the water. Many of their traditions, of which 

 they have an immense number, refer to this passage. 



A very extraordinary part of the Vitian creed, is that which gives 

 not only to the lower animals (or at least to such as consort with man), 

 but also to inanimate objects, a future existence. Thus they have 

 their thimbathimba ni kuli, ni vuaka, ni niu, or elysiums for dogs, pigs, 

 cocoa-nuts, &c. These are usually on some inaccessible or desert 

 rock or island. Persons who pass near the places appropriated to the 

 animals pretend to hear the cries of the ghostly herds; sometimes 

 they will say "There is a great feast in such a place; don't you 

 hear the squeaking of the pigs that are killed and are coming to the 

 thimbathimba ?" The paradise of cocoa-nuts for the island of Rewa is 

 at the village of Longia, the chief of which frequently complains that 

 he cannot sleep at night when there is a feast on the island, for the 

 noise made by the cracking of the fruit. 



One of the most important of the native traditions relates to what is 

 called the Waluvu levu, or great flood, of which the following account 

 was given by Veindovi (the chief captured at Rewa), and confirmed 

 from other sources. After the islands had been peopled by the first 

 man and woman, a great rain came, and the waters began to rise. 

 Then there came two enormous double canoes, commanded one by 

 Rokona, the god of carpenters, and the other by his head workman, 

 Rokola. They picked up a number of the people, and kept them on 

 board until the flood subsided, when they deposited them again on 

 the islands. One account gave the whole number that were saved as 

 only eight, and stated that they landed first on the island of Mberigga, 

 the people of which entertain a high opinion of their own rank and 

 lineage, as direct descendants of the survivors. Veindovi said that in 

 former times the Feejeeans always kept large canoes laid up in readi- 

 ness against another flood, and it is only of late that the custom has 

 been discontinued.* 



* This statement (which we heard from others in the same terms) may induce us to 

 inquire whether there might not have been some occurrence in the actual history of the 

 islands to give rise to this tradition, and the custom here mentioned. On the 7th of No- 

 vember, 1837, the Pacific Ocean was traversed from east to west by an immense wave, 



