580 



the clan chief; but if the injured person belonged to another 

 clan, or even to another family, the relatives and clansmen 

 would take things into their own hands. If they were strong 

 enough, they would kill a man of the offender's clan or family. 

 It seems, however, that this sort of justice did not interest 

 the clan so much as the family in the narrower sense of the 

 word — the brothers, in the first place, the father, and the first 

 cousins. If those were not strong enough, they could ''hire" 

 a man or men by payment of pigs, arm-shells, and food, to do 

 the business in their place. I gathered that in such a case 

 matters would be considered as squared, and that it would 

 not be followed by an everlasting vendetta within the village. 



Adultery on the part of the woman was punishable by 

 death, if the couple were caught in flagrante delicto^ or if the 

 husband felt strongly about the matter. Under such circum- 

 stances he would have been considered to be within his rights, 

 and would not suffer retaliation. In less flagrant cases of 

 adultery the whole affair might be settled by payment, the 

 woman possibly going over to the co-respondent. In that 

 case the bridal price would have to be repaid to the former 

 husband, in addition to an atonement gift. 



Theft did not seem a very serious offence, except when 

 things were tabooed (see below). Otherwise the man would 

 be possibly chaffed and would acquire a bad name for stealing, 

 which is considered rather in the light of a joke than as a 

 serious shortcoming. 



Perhaps the most important of criminal offences, in Mailu 

 as in all other Papuo-Melanesian tribes, was the practice of 

 evil magic. As far as I could ascertain, however, there were 

 not many magicians in the Mailu district. Nevertheless, 

 there were always a few men believed to possess powers for 

 good and evil, but much mor© distinctly for evil (comp. chap. v.). 

 I do not think, however, that there would be any means of 

 redress against their evil magic. If attacked by one of them, 

 people would be much more likely to try to propitiate him by 

 gifts. Whether these men, who undoubtedly wielded much 

 more authority than anyone else in the village, were ever 

 appealed to for the administration of justice, I am unable to 

 say in the case of the Mailu, though I have very positive 

 confirmatory evidence in the case of the tribes of the Central 

 Division. 



The nature of the punishment for crimes when the 

 offender was from another village will be dealt with in the 

 next section. In this case crime was nearly always evil magic. 



Taboo (Gora). — The word Gora means tahoo in its most 

 general sense — i.e., corresponds to the word forhidden. If 



