sorter's journal. 



115 



tliat they had recovered from the enemy so inestimable a 

 a rehc. Dr. Hoffman seeing a man with three or four 

 skulls strung round his waist, asked him for them, and 

 they were given up immediately, although they had be- 

 longed to his father, brother, and near relations. Next 

 day several appeared at the village with skulls to traffic 

 for harpoons. A very old man came to the village as a 

 representative from one of the tribes, and wishing to make 

 me a present, but having nothing else to give me, took 

 from his neck a string of bones cut in the form of their 

 gods, and assured me they were the bones of his grand- 

 mother. 



In religion these people are mere children ; their raorais 

 are their baby-houses, and their gods are their dolls. I 

 have seen Gattanewa with all his sons, and many others 

 sitting for hours together clapping their hands and singing 

 before a number of little wooden gods laid out in small 

 houses erected for the occasion, and ornamented with 

 strips of cloth. They were such houses as a child would 

 have made, of about two feet long and eighteen inches 

 high, and no less than ten or twelve of them in a cluster^ 

 like a small village. By the side of these were several 

 canoes, furnished with their paddles, seines, harpoons, and 

 other fishing apparatus, and round the whole a line was 

 drawn to show that the place was tabooed. Within this 

 line was Gattanewa and others, like overgrown babies, 

 singing and clapping their hands, sometimes laughing and 

 talking, and appearing to give their ceremony no attention. 

 He asked me if the place was not very fine ; and it was 

 on this occasion that he tabooed me, in order to give me 

 an opportunity of approaching the gods, and examining 

 them more closely. The whole ceremony of tabooing 

 me consisted in taking a piece of white cloth from the 

 hole through his ear, and tying it around my hat as a band. 

 1 wore this badge for several days, and, simple as it was, 

 , every one 1 passed would call out taboo^ and avoid touch- 

 ing me. I inquired the cause of this ceremony of Gat- 

 tanewa ; he told me he was going to catch tortoise for the 

 gods, and that he should have to pray to them several 

 days and nights for success, during which time he would 

 be tabooed, and dare not enter a house frequented by wo> 

 men. 



