Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 87.djvu/49

Rh were "covered with a layer of fat" and white men he had been told were salty or flavored strongly with tobacco. In old days in Fiji, the highest praise one could bestow upon a dish was to liken it to a cooked man. When in Fiji, I several times overheard the remark "were it not for the English I would eat you," and in quarrelling the commonest slur is to call an antagonist (Mbakola) a man to be eaten. Our abhorrence of cannibalism, which is after all a sentimental matter in so far as the mere eating is concerned, was not shared by the old Fijians of experience, for "men are good; indeed the best of all meat," and as Ratu Epele once said "he never met a man without thinking how he would taste."

Some Fijian names for food are curious; thus bula-na-kau signifies beef, for when Captain Eagleston brought the two original cattle to Fiji he told the natives that the animals were a "bull and a cow."

Ratu Epele delighted to play at draughts with a tawny-haired albino chief whose light skin was profusely bespeckled with brown blotches and whose eyes were dull blue. This chief's function seemed to be solely that of a messenger and draught player, and invariably the games were won by the king, for no matter how great an advantage the albino might win, he "committed suicide" at the last by placing all his pieces at the mercy of his lord and master.

Ratu Epele, the most interesting chief in the Pacific, died in 1901, and with him there passed away the last champion of the old in Fiji. Born of the highest rank and to a life of war and action, fate had robbed him of his birthright and left him but dreams and memories. Like the lingering spark of a fire that can never burn again, this spirit of old cannibal days faded into oblivion. His son, the Honorable Ratu Kadavu Levu, who succeeded him as Roko Tui Tailevu, has been carefully educated under British auspices, and is a member of the Legislative council.

The cleanliness of Fijian houses is remarkable, indeed in heathen times they were far more careful in this respect than at present, for the least offal of any description, even a hair, might be used by an enemy to bewitch its originator. Even to-day the fear of witchcraft, Ndrau-ni-kau, is very real in Fiji. In order to bring ill-fortune to your enemy, you have but to discover something which he has cast off and burn it wrapped in the proper leaves, reciting certain spells. Or you may bury a cocoanut beneath his hearth, or slowly melt the wax from his image thus causing your victims lingering decline and death. The missionaries have made every effort to destroy this belief, but unfortunately they do not seek to replace it by a more wholesome understanding of the nature of filth-diseases, and thus as faith in witchcraft declines certain bodily ills increase.

In common with other south-sea islanders, the Fijians were a