A WHOLE TRIBE EATEN. 177 



taro (Caladium esculentum, Schott, var.), called " Ku- 

 rilagi" was pointed out as having been eaten with a 

 whole tribe of people. The story sounds strange, but 

 as a number of natives were present when it was told, 

 several of whom corroborated the various statements, 

 or corrected the proper names that occurred, its truth 

 appears unimpeachable. In the interior of Viti Levu, 

 about three miles N.N.E. from Namosi, there dwelt a 

 tribe, known by the name of Kai-na-loca, who in days 

 of yore gave great offence to the ruling chief of the Na- 

 mosi district, and, as a punishment of their misdeeds, 

 the whole tribe was condemned to die. Every year the 

 inmates of one house were baked and eaten, fire was set 

 to the empty dwelling, and its foundation planted with 

 Jcurilagi. In the following year, as soon as this taro 

 was ripe, it became the signal for the destruction of the 

 next house and its inhabitants, and the planting of a 

 fresh field of taro. Thus, house after house, family after 

 family, disappeared, until Ratuibuna, the father of the 

 present chief Kuruduadua, pardoned the remaining few, 

 and allowed them to die a natural death. In 1860, only 

 one old woman, living at Cagina, was the sole survivor 

 of the Na-loca people. Picture the feelings of these 

 unfortunate wretches, as they watched the growth of the 

 ominous taro ! Throughout the dominions of the power- 

 ful chief whose authority they had insulted, their lives 

 were forfeited, and to escape into territories where they 

 were strangers would, in those days, only have been to 

 hasten the awful doom awaiting them in their own 

 country. Nothing remained save to watch, watch, 

 watch, the rapid development of the kurilagi. As leaf 



N 



