REWA. 115 
rest followed suit, to the evident distress of the attendant. It was 
afterwards understood that his anxiety arose from the vessel being 
tabooed, as every thing belonging or appropriated to the use of the 
king is. The Papalangi chiefs are exempted from these restrictions. 
When the meal was finished, the whole company seated themselves 
in a semicircle. The house was now converted into an audience-hall, 
and the officers and stewards of the king entered to render their report 
of the day respecting the management of his business. A chief had 
just arrived to pay his respects to the king, and was dressed in a piece 
of new tapa, which was wrapped around his body in numerous folds. 
When he had seated himself, he unrolled it, and tore it into strips of 
three fathoms in length, which he distributed to the chiefs around him, 
who immediately substituted it for their own dresses. This chief was 
the messenger announcing a tribute from Kantavu, and he had come 
to receive the commands of the king relative to its presentation, which 
was fixed upon to take place the next day. 
Ava was chewing when Captain Hudson and his party entered. 
They were kindly received by the king, who seated them near him. 
There is a peculiar ceremony observed among this people in mixing 
their ava. It having been first chewed by several young persons, on 
the pouring in of the water, they all, following the ambati, raise a 
kind of howl, and say “ Ai sevu.” The people present were arranged 
in a semicircle, having the chief operator in the centre, with an im- 
mense wooden bowl before him. The latter, immediately after the 
water is poured in, begins to strain the liquid through the woody fibres 
of the vau, and at the same time sings. He is accompanied in his 
song by those present, who likewise imitate all his motions with the 
upper part of their bodies while in a sitting posture. The motions 
keep time to the song. ‘The king joined occasionally in the song; and 
when any important stage of the operation was arrived at, the song 
ceased, and a clapping of hands ensued. As each cup was filled to be 
served out, the ambati sitting near uttered the same wild howl as 
before. ‘The first cup is filled from another, that answers both for 
dipper and funnel, having a hole in it, over which he who brews the 
ava places his finger when dipping, and then withdrawing it, lets the 
liquid run out in a stream. They are very particular to see that no 
one touches the king’s cup except the cupbearer. 
On the present occasion, a worthless Englishman by the name of 
James Housman, called Jim or Jimmy, officiated. Few would have 
distinguished him from a native, so closely was he assimilated to them 
in ideas and feelings, as well as in his crouching before the chiefs, his 
mode of sitting, and slovenly walk. On the king’s finishing drinking, 
