244 SANTA CRUZ. 
crossing over to the Reefs from Ndeni they had to get up as far east as 
possible, their sail being small and the westerly set very strong, and it 
was often doubtful whether they could make Matema or not; if they 
failed, they had to risk the reefs in the night and make for Nukapu. 
On the return journey they were lucky if they could make land at the 
west end of Ndeni, at Te Motu, and should the wind fail them or veer 
round there was the prospect of a steady pull for hours, often with an 
inferior crew, against wind and tide and current. With the settling 
of white missionaries again in the group, it will be absolutely necessary 
to provide a launch for the purpose of work round Ndeni itself, and in 
order to insure regular and easy voyages to the Reefs, even if no Maoris 
are sent. Utupua and Vanikolo lie too far away to be reached from 
Santa Cruz in a launch, but were there a powerful auxiliary schooner 
in the eastern Solomons regular visits could be paid to all these places. 
The Heathen religion in the Santa Cruz group consists of the worship 
of the dead. The people of importance become ghosts, duka, after 
death, and a stock of wood is set up in their houses to represent them. 
Offerings of pigs’ flesh and of the first fruits of the crop are made to 
the duka from time to time and are laid in front of the stock. These 
offerings are not allowed to lie there long, and are soon eaten by the 
offerers on the plea that the duka having now eaten the immaterial 
substance of the gifts, the offerers are free to eat the fleshy part. 
The duka, when offended, causes sickness, and the doctor called in 
is one who possesses spiritual power, malete, and who owns a duka him- 
self. ‘Lhese wizards, mendeka, control the weather on a sea journey, 
taking the stock of their duka with them and setting it up in the deck- 
house; they also control the sunshine, the rain, and the wind. In the 
large villages on Ndeni and in the island of Nupani a number of these 
stocks are set up in one house, manduka, and the ghost-house is often a 
building showing some considerable artistic taste in the decoration of 
the pillars or in the carvings. The fear of the duka controls every 
department of life. 
Feather money is peculiar to Santa Cruz; it is made of the red 
breast-feathers of a small honey-eater, a bird of the glossiest black 
plumage all over save for the breast-feathers; the bill is long and 
curved. ‘The birds are caught with birdlime, and they are sometimes 
worn alive tied by the legs to a man’s waist-belt. The red feathers 
are gummed to pigeon’s feathers, and these are bound on a prepared 
foundation in rows, so that only the red is seen. A length of this money 
is about 15 feet. | 
Bishop G. A. Selwyn visited Santa Cruz in 1852, but did not land. 
Four years later he visited the place again and endeavored to make 
friends with the people. Mr. Patteson and the Bishop in the same 
year landed at Utupua, Vanikolo, and Nukapu. At the latter place 
their knowledge of Maori stood them in good stead. In 1862 Bishop 
