Mat Sails of the Pacific. 29 



form for all — a recflaiigular or rhomboidal sail bent to a yard and a 

 boom, and construdled of strips of mat fastened together. It had, 

 with few exceptions, the breadth greater than the length, and was 

 generall}' slung from the mast at a considerable height from the 

 deck, with the after part of the sail raised above the fore part. 

 This pattern was found to the eastward as far as New Guinea, but 

 at various localities the rig was modified. At Amboina in place 

 of one mast two were erecfted and botind together at the top, 

 resembling closely sheers used for raising the mast out of a vessel. 

 At Port Dorey and other settlements on Northern New Guinea 

 three masts were fixed, in a straight line, with the upper ends 

 fastened together. This sail was not .seen east of New Guinea. 

 Making another commencement on the south coast of New Guinea 

 a sail entirely' different was seen. The shape of this may be said 

 to have resembled an attenuated arrow head with the haft removed 

 and the tips of the thin barbs contracted. The sail was provided 

 with a sprit and a boom of equal length, the sprit being about twice 

 the height of the mast and having the lower end stepped in a chock 

 on the deck near the foot of the mast. The sailing canoes were 

 double and sometimes treble, and carried two or more sails. The 

 shape of this sail held with little variation among the islands to the 

 eastward almost as far as Fiji, and then became merged into the 

 triangular sail of the Fijians. The people of New Hebrides had a 

 sail shaped just as on the south of New Guinea, but the mast, 

 stepped on top of a house built on the deck inclined forward to lie 

 almost horizontal, and served more as a support for the sprit than 

 an appliance from which to fly the sail. The New Caledonian 

 sails were simply described as triangular. The sails of Fiji and 

 Tonga resembled those just described as regards the spars, but the 

 ends of the sprit and boom were wide apart and the sails extended 

 flush with the extremes. 



To the north and north-west of Fiji, among the Gilbert Isl- 

 ands, Micronesia and the Marianas, the sails were more of the 

 latteen type than any others in the Pacific, but differed from the 

 latteen in having, besides a sprit or yard, a boom of almost equal 

 length. These sails were suspended from a mast which was set on 

 a platform built on the beams of the outrigger and standing dire<ftly 

 over the gunwale next the outrigger. Of course there were minor 

 differences in the proportions peculiar to the many islands, but the 



