110 A MISSION TO VITI. 



vessels filled with spring- water, seem to be the only 

 utensils admitted. In buildings or bures like these, all 

 the male population, married and unmarried, sleeps. 

 The boys, until they have come of age, erect a bure of 

 their own, often built on raised stages over the water, 

 and approachable only by a long, narrow trunk of a 

 tree. The women and girls sleep at home; and it is 

 quite against Fijian etiquette for a husband to take his 

 night's repose anywhere except at one of the public 

 bures of his town or village, though he will go to his 

 family soon after dawn. In the daytime the bures are 

 generally deserted. Towards four o'clock people begin 

 to pour in, and if any strangers arrive they will inva- 

 riably take up their quarters at these places. Here po- 

 litics and all events of the day are discussed, and when 

 talking, the men, even high chiefs, will be plaiting cocoa- 

 nut fibre into sinnet, so much used in the construction of 

 houses, canoes, and arms. And a great deal these people 

 have to talk about : the politics of the groups, inde- 

 pendent of the new element introduced by the cession 

 of the country to England, the never-ending intrigues 

 of the Tonguese immigration, the endeavour of mission- 

 aries, consuls, and traders to spread Christianity and 

 civilization, are rather complicated, and give rise to a 

 good deal of discussion and speculation. 



When evening is coming on, the bure is beginning to 

 fill ; most of the fires between the sleeping-places are 

 lit, and the natives are leisurely stretched on the mats, 

 their legs cocked up the stages, like Yankees in a ta- 

 vern all smoking their cigarettes, made of self-grown 

 tobacco and dry banana leaves. Now come the kava- 



