Page:Ballantyne--The Coral Island.djvu/250

 them, Ralph, which is called tabu, and they carry it to great lengths. If a man chooses a particular tree for his god, the fruit o' that tree is tabued to him; and if he eats it, he is sure to be killed by his people, and eaten, of course, for killing means eating hereaway. 'Then, you see that great mop o' hair on the chief's head? Well, he has a lot o' barbers to keep it in order; and it's a law that whoever touches the head of a living chief or the body of a dead one, his hands are tabued; so, in that way, the barbers' hands are always tabued, and they daren't use them for their lives, but have to be fed like big babies, as they are, sure enough!"

"That's odd, Bill. But look there," said I, pointing to a man whose skin was of a much lighter color than the generality of the natives. "I've seen a few of these light-skinned fellows among the Fejeeans. They seem to me to be of quite a different race."

'So they are," answered Bill. "These fellows come from the Tongan Islands, which lie a long way to the eastward. They come here to build their big war-canoes; and as these take two, and sometimes four years, to build, there's always some o' the brown-skms among the black sarpents o' these islands."

"By the way, Bill," said I, "your mentioning serpents, reminds me that I have not seen a reptile of any kind since I came to this part of the world."

"No more there are any," said Bill, "if ye except the niggers themselves, there's none on the islands, but a lizard or two and some sich harmless things. But I never seed any myself. If there's none on the land, however, there's more than enough in the water, and that minds me of a wonderful brute they have here. But, come, I'll show it to you." So saying Bill arose, and, leaving the