METHOD OF PRODUCING FIRE. . 65 



the work of the Motu women to the pottery of the Fijians, and 

 between the different processes employed, there is a considerable 

 advance in the art of pottery manufacture, as already described in 

 the case of Fiji. There, a glaze is for the first time employed ; 

 whilst in their finish, their comparative elegance of design, in their 

 multiplicity of pattern, and in the various purposes for which the}' 

 are employed from the cooking-pot up to the ornamental jar, these 

 Fijian vessels are greatly superior to all I have referred to, whether 

 the work of a woman of Port Dory, of an Andaman Islander, of a 

 woman of Bougainville Straits, or of a woman of the Motu tribe in 

 New Guinea.^ 



The Polynesian plan of producing fire, which is known as the 

 " stick-and-groove " method, was that which was occasionally em- 

 ployed by my native guides during my excursions in St. Christoval 

 and in the island of Simbo. At the risk of being: charored with un- 

 due prolixity, I will briefly describe it as I saw it performed. A dry 

 piece of wood is first taken, and one side of it is sliced so as to form 

 a flat surface. A small bit of the same wood is then pointed at one 

 end and worked briskl}'' along a groove which it soon forms in the 

 flat surface. The friction in some three or four minutes produces 

 smoke ; and finally a fine powder, which has been collecting in a 

 small heap at the end of the groove, begins to smoulder. After being 

 carefully nursed by the breath of the operator, the tiny flame is 

 transferred to a piece of touch-wood, and the object is attained. In 

 most native houses in districts not often visited by the trader, pieces 

 of the wood used for this purpose are left lying about on the floor. 

 Wax matches, however, form an important item in the large quan- 

 tities of trade-articles which pass into the hands of the natives of 

 some of the islands ; and in such islands any other method of pro- 

 ducing fire is not generally employed. In most cases, when I had 

 omitted to take matches with me in my excursions, my natives, 

 although very desirous of getting a light for their pipes, were too 

 lazy to obtain it by making use of the more laborious method of the 

 "stick-and-groove." When making their own journeys in the bush, 

 they carry along with them a piece of smouldering wood, a ])re- 



seems to me, however, that their principal purpose is as beaters, the simply cut patterns of 

 the beater of Bougainville Straits, which serve to give the tool a better hold on the clay, 

 being elaborated in the case of the -New Guinea beater into ornamental patterns which 

 have the same purpose. 



1 Two kinds of earthen pots from the Admiralty Islands are figured in the official narrative 

 of the cruise of the "Challenger " (figs. 242 and 243). They differ in shape from those of 

 Bougainville Straits and are probably made in a different manner. 



