Page:Williams and Calvert, Fiji and the Fijians, New York, 1860.djvu/50

30 FIJI AND THE FIJIANS. which would be considered worse than a person on land passing behind the back of his Sovereign. Most singular among these customs is the hale muri, " follow in falling," the attendant falling because his master has fallen. This is to prevent shame from resting on the Chief, who, as he ought, has to pay for the respect. One day, I came to a long bridge formed of a single cocoa- nut tree, which was thrown across a rapid stream, the opposite bank of which was two or three feet lower, so that the declivity was too steep to be comfortable. The pole was also wet and slippery, and thus my crossing safely was very doubtful. Just as I commenced the experi- ment, a heathen said, with much animation, " To-day I shall have a musket ! " I had, however, just then to heed my steps more than his words, and so succeeded in reaching the other side safely. When I asked him why he spoke of a musket, the man replied, " I felt certain you would fall in attempting to go over, and I should have fallen after you ; " (that is, appeared to be equally clumsy ;) " and, as the bridge is high, the water rapid, and you a gentleman, you would not have thought of giving me less than a musket." The best produce of the gardens, the seines, and the sties in Fiji, goes to the Chiefs, together with compliments the most extravagant and oriental in their form. Warrior Chiefs often owe their escape in battle to their inferiors — even when enemies — dreading to strike them. This fear partly arises from Chiefs being confounded with deities, and partly from the certainty of their death being avenged on the man who slew them. Women of rank often escape strangling, at the death of their lord, because there are not at hand men of equal rank to act as execu- tioners. Such an excess of homage must of course be maintained by a most vigorous infliction of punishment for any breach of its observance ; and a vast number of fingers missing from the hands of men and women, have gone as the fine for disrespectful or awkward conduct. In Fiji, subjects do not pay rent for their land, but a kind of tax on all their produce, beside giving their labour occasionally in peace, and their service, when needed, in war, for the benefit of the King or their own Chief. Tax-paying in Fiji, unlike that in Britain, is associated with all that the people love. The time of its taking place is a high day ; a day for the best attire, the pleasantest looks, and the kindest words ; a day for display : whales' teeth and cowrie necklaces, orange-cowrie and pearl-shell breast ornaments, the scarlet frontlet, the newest style of neck-band, white armlets, bossed knee and ankle bands, tortoise-shell hair pins, (eighteen inches long,) cocks' tail feathers, the whitest ?nasi, the most graceful turban, powder of jet black, and rouge of the deepest