104 CUSTOMS OF THE FEEJEE GROUP. 



when preparing for a great assembly of chiefs: it is first anointed 

 with oil, and then the neck, breast, and arms, down to the elbows, are 

 daubed with a black pigment; a white bandage of native cloth is 

 bound around the head, and tied over the temple in a graceful knot; 

 a club is placed in the hand, and laid across the breast, to indicate in 

 the next world that the deceased was a chief and warrior. The body 

 is then laid on a bier, and the chiefs of the subject tribes assemble ; 

 each tribe presents a whale's tooth, and the chief or spokesman says : 

 "This is our offering to the dead; we are poor and cannot find riches." 

 All now clap their hands, and the king or a chief of rank replies: 

 "Ai mu-mundi ni mate," (the end of death,) to which all the people 

 present respond, " e dina," (it is true.) The female friends then 

 approach and kiss the corpse, and if any of his wives wish to die and 

 be buried with him, she runs to her brother or nearest relative and 

 exclaims, " I wish to die, that I may accompany my husband to the 

 land where his spirit has gone ! love me, and make haste to strangle 

 me, that I may overtake him !" Her friends applaud her purpose, and 

 being dressed and decorated in her best clothes, she seats herself on a 

 mat, reclining her head on the lap of a woman ; another holds her 

 nostrils, that she may not breathe through them ; a cord, made by 

 twisting fine tapa (masi), is then put around her neck, and drawn 

 tight by four or five strong men, so that the struggle is soon over. 

 The cord is left tight, and tied in a bow-knot, until the friends of the 

 husband present a whale's tooth, saying, " This is the untying of the 

 cord of strangling." The cord is then loosed, but is not removed 

 from the neck of the corpse. 



When the grave is finished, the principal workman takes the four 

 reeds used by the priests, and passes them backwards and forwards 

 across each other ; he then lines the pit or grave with fine mats, and 

 lays two of the leaves at the head and two at the foot of the grave ; on 

 these the corpse of the chief is placed, with two of his wives, one on 

 each side, having their right and left hands, respectively, laid on his 

 breast; the bodies are then wrapped together in folds of native cloth; 

 the grave is then filled in, and the sacred earth is laid on, and a stone 

 over it. All the men who have had any thing to do with the dead 

 body take off their maro or masi, and rub themselves all over with 

 the leaves of a plant they call koaikoaia. A friend of the parties takes 

 new tapa, and clothes them, for they are not allowed to touch any 

 thing, being tabooed persons. At the end of ten days, the head chief 

 of the tribe provides a great feast (mburua), at which time the tabooed 



