NOT ALL FIJIANS CANNIBALS. 179 
steamed are not devoted to any other culinary purpose. 
Another curious circumstance is, that whilst the natives 
eat every other kind of food with their fingers, human 
flesh is eaten with forks, having three or four prongs, and 
generally made of the hard wood of a species of Casua- 
rina. Kivery one of these forks is known by its par- 
ticular, often obscene, name, and they are handed down 
as heirlooms from generation to generation ; indeed they 
are so much valued, that it required no slight persuasion 
and a handsome equivalent to obtain specimens of them 
for our ethnological collection. 
It is customary to suspend some of the bones of those 
human beings that have been eaten in the trees before 
the Bure-ni-sa ; and we saw several of these trophies, on 
some of which was growing a beautiful little fern (Hemi- 
onitis lanceolata, Hook.), not previously seen, and only 
gathered afterwards on the very summit of Buke Levu.* 
It would be a mistake to suppose that all Fijians, not 
converted to Christianity, are cannibals. There were 
whole towns, as for instance Nakelo, on the Rewa 
river, which made a bold stand against this practice, 
declaring that it was tabu, forbidden to them by their 
gods, to indulge in it. The common people through- 
out the group, as well as women of all classes, were 
by custom debarred from it. Cannibalism was thus re- 
stricted to the chiefs and gentry, and again amongst 
them there is a number, who for want of a better appella- 
tion may be called the Liberal party, and who never 
* Mr. Waterhouse speaks of “grinning skulls looking down on us ;” 
but I never saw any skulls at this place, though carefully examining all 
the trees, nor do I know for certain whether that part of the body is ever 
suspended in trees. 
NQ 
