368 A MISSION TO VITI. 



The word " Niu " is common to most Polynesian lan- 

 guages, often taking the form of " Nia " and " Niau ;" 

 the New Zealand " Nikau," by which the Maoris desig- 

 nate their indigenous palm (Areca sapida, Sol.), does be- 

 long, and perhaps even " Nipa," the Philippine name of 

 Nipa fruticans, may belong, to the same group of words. 

 We further trace the Fijian " Niu," or with the article 

 " a " (a niu) before it, in the Anao, Anowe, Anau, and 

 Nu, by which names a sugar-yielding palm, the Arenga 

 saccliarifera, is known in different parts of the Indian 

 Archipelago. The existence of a collective term for 

 " palms " never having been pointed out, the passage in 

 John xii. 13, "Took leaves of the palm-trees," is ren- 

 dered both in the Viwa and the London edition of the 

 Fijian Bible, " Era sa kauta na drau ni balabala,''- 

 literally, " Took leaves of the tree-fern," for balabala 

 is a tree-fern (Alsophila excelsa, R Br.). " Niu " is the 

 term that ought to have been used, there being two 

 kinds of real palms in Syria, but no tree-ferns. 



Only one of all the palms as yet discovered in Fiji 

 is a fan-palm, the rest having pinnatiiid leaves. This 

 is the Niu Masei, Sakiki or Viu, a new genus of Cory- 

 phince (Pritchardia pacifica, Seem, et Wendl.), differing 

 from all described ones in several important characters. 

 The blades of the leaves are made into fans, " Iri masei " 

 or " ai Viu," which are only allowed to be used by the 

 chiefs, as those of the Talipot (CorypJia umbraculifera, 

 Linn.) formerly were in Ceylon. The common people 

 have to content themselves with fans made of Pandanus 

 carlcosus. Hence, though there is not a village of im- 

 portance without the Sakiki, or, as it is termed in the 



