240 FUNAFUTI ATOLL. 



engaged in rough work meaning to save more valued clothes. 

 The Tahitian " tiputa " has been imposed by the mission upon 

 the women; both sexes wear the Fijian "lava lava" of European 

 calico, another modern innovation. For state occasions the men 

 wear shirt and trousers, and the women loose gowns in which they 

 each appear awkward and uneasy. I did not learn that tappa cloth 

 was made on the atoll. 



THE TUKAI. 



The ancient masculine costume, the " tukai," is well sh.>\vn by 

 the figure given by Wilkes* of the Funafuti native wearing one, 

 which is described as " a strip of fine matting made of the panJanus 

 leaf, about eight inches wide and ten feet long, and fringed on each 

 side." On Nukufetan the same Expedition saw pandanns mats 

 " worn as a girdle of thick fringe, from eight inches to a foot 

 broad, tied about the loins so as to cover in part the maro : to 

 this they gave the name of 'takai'; the last was used as a wrapper 

 about the body and legs." 



Edge-Partington figures! this garment as from Rotumah, des- 

 cribing it as now obselete. 



Whereas the " titi " was simply tied round the waist, the tukai 

 was first passed between the limbs and then around the body. 

 From the accompanying sketch (Plate xiii.) of a man putting 

 on his tukai it will be obvious that although this dress has 

 acquired a secondary resemblance to the titi, it is really homo- 

 logous with the T bandage formerly worn by the inhabitants of 

 the neighbouring atolls of Atafu and Fakaafu.J 



The tukai primarily consists of a long narrow mat with a fringe 

 of unwoven strands. Comparing the dress as it appeared to me 

 on Funafuti with the drawings of Wilkes and Edge- Parting ton, 

 it will be noticed that the fringe in the modern specimens 1 pro- 

 cured, has greatly broadened, while the total length of the dress 

 has decreased to nearly half. I am unable from the specimens 

 and illustrations at my disposal to trace all the graduations 

 between the ordinary form of the T bandage and the tukai, but I 

 feel convinced of their existence. 



A specimen (fig. 4) of a highly ornate dance tukai, made for 

 me on Funafuti, weighs two pounds four ounces, is six feet six 

 * Wilkes op. cit., \., p. 41. 

 f Edge-Partington loc. cit., ii., pi. li., fig. 4. 



J Wilkes loc. cit., v., plate facing p. 3 and p. 36 ; this loin cloth is 

 also the ordinary masculine dress in the Solomons, as shown in Guppy's 

 Solomon Islands, plate facing p. 102 ; and in Eastern British New 

 Guinea, for example, Finsch Ethnological Atlas, pi. xvi., and Lindt 

 Picturesque New Guinea, pi. xli. ; the most reduced form of which known 

 to me is the string " sihi " of the Motu, exemplified by Lindt, op. cit., pi. 

 xxxiv., the man on the left. 



