Page:Williams and Calvert, Fiji and the Fijians, New York, 1860.djvu/197

MAlsTNEKS AND CUSTOMS. 167 I could cite well authenticated instances of such horrors, but their narration would be far more revolting than profitable. The names of Tampakauthoro, Tanoa, Tuiveikoso, Tuikilakila, and others, are famous in Fiji for the quantity of human flesh which they have individually eaten. But these are but insignificant cannibals in comparison with Ea Undreundre of Rakiraki. Even Fjiians name him with wonder. Bodies procured for his consumption were designated lewe ni bi. The hi is a circular fence or pond made to receive turtles when caught, which then becomes its lewena^ " contents." Ra Undre- undre was compared to such a receptacle, standing ever ready to re- ceive human flesh. The fork used by this monster was honoured with a distinctive epithet. It was named JJndroundro ; a word used to de- note a small person or thing carrying a great burden. This fork was given by his son, Ra Vatu, to my respected friend, the Rev. R. B. Lyth, in 1849. Ra Vatu then spoke freely of his father's propensity, and took Mr. Lyth nearly a mile beyond the precincts of the town, and showed him the stones by which his father registered the number of bodies he had eaten " after his family had begun to grow up." Mr. Lyth found the line of stones to measure two hundred and thirty-two paces. A teacher who accompanied him counted the stones, — eight hundred and seventy-two. If those which had been removed were re- placed, the whole would certainly have amounted to nine hundred, Ra Vatu asserted that his father ate all these persons himself, permit- ting no one to share them with him. A similar row of stones placed to mark the bodies eaten by Naungavuli contained forty-eight, when his becoming a Christian prevented any further addition. The whole family were cannibals extraordinary ; but Ra Vatu wished to exempt himself. It is somewhat remarkable that the only instance of cannibalism in Fiji witnessed by any gentleman of the United States Exploring Ex- pedition, was the eating of a human eye, — a thing which those who have seen many bodies eaten never witnessed, the head, as has been stated already, being always thrown away. One who had been but a very short time in Eiji wrote thus to me : " I have been to Mbau thrice, and have witnessed something of Fijian horrors each time. First visit, I saw them opening an oven, and taking a cooked human body out of it : second visit, limbs of a body prepar- ing for being baked : third visit, a woman of rank who had just had her nose cut off." Visitors, however, generally manifest considerable incredulity on this subject ; though it would not require a long stay actually among the people, to place the matter beyond doubt. An