1 68 SECTIONAL ADDRESSES 



Fijians suggest so much that is similar in their general attitude towards 

 life that it would be an error to omit all allusion to it. Thus, exactly 

 like Nagas, ' the inhabitants of Namosi on being asked for their name 

 will never give it when any one else is present to answer the question.' *^ 

 In both cases the explanation is perhaps to be found in an acute feeling 

 of personal dignity considerably stronger than that which makes it polite 

 among ourselves to apologise when asking a stranger for his name. I 

 take, for further instances, a sample or two from Brewster, Williams and 

 Waterhouse. The first two at any rate must have spent, I suppose, as 

 long in Fiji as I did in the Naga hills, while the third was at any rate 

 14 years in Fiji. 



Speaking of warfare they write as follows : — 



' During the night one of them dreamed that their enemies were near 

 and many in number ; whereupon, with the greatest gallantry, they 

 betook themselves to their canoes and hastened back to Samo-Samo.' *^ 

 A similar account, except for the canoes, might be given of 50 per cent, of 

 raids and expeditions between independent Naga villages. Again, ' when 

 parties on the war-trail met there was much interchange of abuse, boasting 

 and challenging to mortal combat. Then should a man fall, the side 

 to which he belonged promptly bolted. ... I have managed ... to 

 piece together . . . records of nearly 300 years. Although they relate 

 to a period of almost unbroken warfare, but little blood was actually shed. 

 Communities of the trade villages become prosperous and arrogant, and 

 excite the jealousy of their neighbours, who then enter into alliances 

 with other clans and attack the common object of their envy. After 

 desultory fighting, sacking and burning of villages the weaker side 

 would flee further back into the almost inaccessible part of the hills. 

 Both sides by that time would be tired . . . with the fighting, and the 

 defeated party would get time to recuperate and reorganise. Then they 

 would probably retaliate on their foes and turn the tables. It should 

 not be inferred from this that the Fijians are cowards. We and they 

 have different modes of thought — that is all. They will do many things 

 that we should hesitate about.' ^° The whole of this paragraph might 

 have been written, without a word being changed, of the trans-frontier 

 area of the Naga hills down to the present. 



Again, ' a most striking feature in the arrangements for attack is the 

 primary preparation for defeat. Many days are sometimes spent in 

 preparing . . . paths by which to run away easily in case of defeat, 

 while the subsequent attack may not last for many hours. . . . Frequently 

 the army feigns retreat and draws out a sally from the town, a portion of 

 which is almost invariably cut off by ambuscade. Generally the assailants 

 will lie in ambush so as to cut off any small party which may happen to 

 venture into their trap. Women and children are not spared. The 

 slaughter of a pig is apparently equivalent to that of a man. " Seven 

 were killed, the seventh being a pig," is sometimes reported.' ^^ Even 

 so I have heard it reported in the Naga hills that seven heads were taken, 



** Seemann, 190 ; Hutton, I, 219 ; II, 143, 237 ; Mills, II, 270 ; Parry, 239 ; 

 Shakespear, 19. 



" Williams, I, 205. "o Brewster, 59. "i Waterhouse, II, 318. 



