''^ WEAPONS. 



have flattened oval blades like tliat of a paddle. Other clubs again, 

 like those of Guadalcanar, are more cylindrical, and have their Lds 

 but slighty enlarged ; they are often ornamented with the so-called 

 " dyed grass." No weapons of the character of maces came under 

 my observation. Most clubs are pointed at the butt-end to enable 

 them^ to be stuck upright in the ground. These weapons are rarely 

 seen in the hands of the natives of Bougainville Straits, if I may 

 except an ornamental club which is carried at the dances.^ The St. 

 Christoval club is also a defensive weapon. Its flat recurved blade 

 is used to turn aside a spear or an arrow just as the bat is employed 

 to slip a cricket-ball. Some have considered that these weapons are 

 merely paddles. I never saw them put to this use, and I should 

 add that they are most unsuited for such a purpose, being very 

 heavy and sinking in water. I have frequently met natives? when 

 away from the coast, carrying them on their shoulder ; and I often 

 learned from them of the true character of the weapon: Traders, 

 who had been years in this part of the group, spoke of them to me 

 as war-clubs. Together with their spears, the St. Christoval natives 

 carry them during their hostile incursions against the bushmen- 

 A singular W pattern that occurs on the flat blades of these St. 

 Christoval clubs was for a long time a puzzle to me. However 

 a very probable explanation of its origin has been given by Major- 

 General Pitt-Rivers.^ It is one which goes to show that these 

 curved flat-bladed clubs originated as paddles, and that in proportion 

 as they came to be employed also for purposes of defence, their form 

 and material were in time changed, until their original use wa.s 

 either lost or forgotten. In the early forms of this paddle-club, the 

 swell of the blade suggested the shape of the body of a fish /and 

 the profile of a fish's head with the jaws agape was added to 'com- 

 plete the resemblance. In course of time the blade lost its fish-like 

 form, but the outline of the snout with jaws agape was still retained 

 as an ornament. In this manner the W pattern of the present clubs 

 originated. Tlie steps in the production of this pattern may be 

 illustrated in a series of clubs from those with most marked fish-like 

 form to those where the profile of the fish's snout in the form of a 

 W alone remains; and jthis again by the omission of the mouth is 

 often rei)laced by a triangular nob. 



^ 1 These ornamental clubs exactly resemble, both in form and decoration, some clubs from 

 New Ireland in the liritish IMuseum. 



2 " Nature," July 14th, 1881, I differ from the writer in considering these articles as 

 clubs, not paddks. 



