Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 20.djvu/344

330 knives and forks. The water in which food has been boiled is generally drunk, even when it is fish-broth. This is their only warm drink. Tea and coffee are unknown. They have no intoxicant, and are content and healthy with no stronger beverage than the fresh cocoa-nut and running stream afford.

The women excel in making netted bags of all sizes. The large bags, which are used by the women to carry their burdens in, and also as cradles, were interesting as the only article I had met which was also made by the aborigines of Australia. The women are charged with the bartering, and are skillful at driving a bargain; and they have the Eastern custom of going for water at daybreak, carrying the water on the head or shoulder, and meeting for gossip at the well.



When food is plentiful, the day is generally closed with a ball in the open air under the cocoa-nut trees. The young people dance, while their seniors look on and criticise or commend. They will often keep up the dancing, to the monotonous music of their drums, until the small hours of the morning.

Strangers are saluted by putting the hand to the nose and then to the stomach. Shaking hands and kissing are alike unknown; but many among the inland tribes welcome their friends by chucking them under the chin. It is considered bad manners to omit, on meeting a