54 FUNAFUTI ATOLL. 



The usual sequence of such unrestricted intercourse, infanticide, 

 was generally practised upon Funafuti. Indeed it was once obli- 

 gatory to destroy each alternate child. Mr. O'Brien tells me 

 that thirty or forty years ago, he knew women to enter the 

 lagoon before the occurrence of birth, that the child might be 

 immediately drowned. On Niutao, " the ancient rule was to 

 rear only two children in each family. The life of the third 

 might be redeemed ; the rest were put to death as soon as born."* 

 " On Nukufetau, as elsewhere, infanticide or foeticide was the 

 law of the land. Only one some say two were allowed to live 

 in each family, the rest were strangled. But it was possible for 

 parents to ransom their offspring by giving a present to the 

 chiefs."! 



At times, to allow the coconuts to grow up and to give the 

 fishing grounds a rest, the permanent village is temporarily aban- 

 doned, and the whole tribe move to another locality. Several 

 duplicate villages are built about the lagoon, perfect sometimes 

 even to the chapel and court house, wherein each family owns a 

 residence, and to which they periodically move to enjoy a change 

 of air and scene. Probably it was one of these temporary 

 settlements which Moresby| saw at Funafuti, and mistook for a 

 deserted village. 



The permanent village consists of a score of huts arranged in a 

 long straggling street parallel to the beach. This street has a hard 

 beaten floor, which is kept swept and weeded with great care by 

 the women, who devote fixed hours to this work. From the 

 main street branch roads, which are metalled with shingle and 

 curbed with blocks of coral. Wrong doers are punished, under 

 the modern system, in imitation of colonial justice, by being set 

 to repair these roads. An avenue of breadfruit trees casts a 

 pleasant shade along the street, while around and above all 

 tower the loftier coconut palms. Each hut is at least a dozen 

 yards from its next door neighbour, and has its own kitchen 

 situated some little distance away. Two or more married couples 

 sometimes live together in a hut of about twelve by twenty feet. 

 The floor is usually carpeted with large pandanus mats, but in 

 the more pretentious stone dwellings the ground is covered 

 with fine shingle. The roof, pitched in European style with 



* Gill Jottings from the Pacific, 1885, p. 27. 



t Newell Proc. Austr. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1895 (1896), p. 609. 



J Moresby New Guinea, 1876, p. 74. 



Until lately the caverns of Atiu and Mangaiia were despoiled of the 

 finest stalactite columns, in order to adorn the premises of the chiefs by 

 keeping the snow white sea peebles in their place, much as at home we 

 use ornamental tiles for gravelled walks. Anciently the maraes of their 

 gods were thus adorned." Gill loc. cit., p. 86. The graves in Funafuti 

 were likewise gravelled. 



