TAMBU-HOUSES. 71 



journey in a canoe. The natives of the neighbouring island of Ulaua, 

 or Ulawa, propitiate the shark with offerings of their own shell- 

 money and of porpoise teeth, which they prize even more than 

 money ; and, if a sacred shark has attempted to seize a man who 

 has been able to finally escape from its jaws, they are so much afraid 

 that they will throw him back into the sea to be devoured.^ We 

 learn from Mr. Ellis^ and from Messrs. Tyerman and Bennet,^ that 

 in the Society Islands sharks were deified, that temples were erected 

 for their worship in which the fisherman propitiated the favour of 

 the shark-god, and that almost every family had its particular shark 

 as its tutelary deity to which it bowed and made oblations. 



At Alu and Treasury in Bougainville Straits, the tambu-house, 

 which is such a prominent feature in the villages of the eastern 

 islands, is represented by a mere open canoe-shed, for the most part 

 destitute of ornament, and apparently held in but little veneration^ 

 Rows of the lower jaws of pigs, which are strung up inside the build- 

 ings, signify, as in the eastward island.'^, the number of animals 

 slaughtered for the feast that was held to celebrate the completion 

 of the canoe-shed. In the island of Faro, the canoe-houses are onlv 

 temporary sheds built over the large war-canoes, and can have no 

 sacred character in the mind of the native, the tambu-houses in the 

 two principal villages of Toma and Sinasoro having no connection 

 with the war-canoes. The tambu-house of the village of Toma is a 

 neat-lookino" building;- about 18 feet hio-h, 45 feet lono- and 25 feet 

 broad. It is open at the ends and partly open at the sides, and is 

 built of much the same materials as the dwelling-houses. The roof, 

 which is neatly thatched with the leav^es of the sago-palm, is sup- 

 ported on stout ridge-poles by a central and two lateral rows of 

 posts. There is no carving and but little decoration about the build- 

 ing ; and from the circumstance of its being sometimes converted 

 into a temporary drying-house for copra, we may draw some infer- 

 ence as to the degree of sanctity in which such a building is held. 



The weapons in common use in these islands are spears, clubs, 

 bows and arrows, and tomahawks. An indication of the disposition 

 of the natives may be usually obtained by observing whether arms 



^"Eeligious Beliefs and Practices in Melanesia," by the Rev. R. H. Codrington, M.A. 

 "Journal of the Anthropological Institute." Vol. x. 



2 " Polynesian Researches : " London, 1853. Vol. i., pp. 167, 329. 



3" Voyages and Travels of the Rev. D. Tyerman and George Bennet, Esq. : " London, 1831. 

 Vol. i., p. 247. 



