FIJIAN FIRE-WALKERS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21916, 27 September 1934, Page 16

FIJIAN FIRE-WALKERS

MYSTERY TO EUROPEANS YOUNG CHIEFTAIN'S HOPES [BY- TELEGRAPH'—OWN CORRESPONDENT] DUNEDIN. Wedneidiy

Reference to the mystery of the Fijian fire walkers was made in an interview by Dr. J. R. Elder, professor of history at Otago University, who recently spent five days in Fiji.

Dr. Elder said he was very interested in meeting a young Fijian chieftain, who in his t student days at the Auckland University College was known as Taka. His full name was Ratu Edward Takabau. Taka told him that fire walking was one of the things the European would never understand. Fire walkers came from a neighbouring island and Taka told the professor that only one man in the tribe had the power to walk on red-hor stones. He called on other member* to follow him yet they were not burned. But if they attempted to crops the stones without being called on by the leader their feet would be burned. "Would you follow if you were called to do so?" Dr. Elder asked the chieftain. "Certainly I would," he replied. He hoped to be invited to follow the leader one day and he was confident that his feet would not b#« burned.