SKETCHES OF SUNLIT SEAS.

Otago Witness, Issue 3514, 19 July 1921, Page 55

SKETCHES OF SUNLIT SEAS.

By

TR PANA.

For the Otago Witness. THE PASSING OF A CHIEF. The big chief was dead. Almost as rapidly as the force that sends news speeding along strands of wire under seas and over land sped the mouth-carried message. It penetrated into neat villages in the interior and travelled to palm-shaded huts strewn along the sands guarded by spray-covered reefs. The big chief died last night. That was the message. Out to tiny islands it went, to isolated plantations, to parties drinking kava, to head men in the midst of haranguing their people, to college students poring over their books. The big chief died hi-t night. It was enough. Respect is instinct with the Tongtins. Custom, habit lias it that al 1 people shall be at the ceremony of laying great men at rest. And so the people came to the burial, came to the pa ni-fringed capital, where the flags were at half-mast, and where smoke from native ovens ro e near the building that sheltered the dead chief. They came and foregathered in the yard, bark-cloth enshrouded figures that * paid their respects—cried, chanted, praised—and then remained silent listening to the mournful, rythmic noises of the close relation:'. kneeling at the side of the big chief. There was sorrow in the subdued wailing, sorrow in the bowed figures of the people, sorrow in their silence. • —Sorrow and Sunshine.— The church hells tolled. Down the white, glaring roadway marched a troop of college students, a band at their head. Black stream:; of ribbon fell from the .‘■■houldi-rs of the youths with instruments: a broad dark bar was on the arm of each boy- - eft . . . left, they marched to the tap of the rant led drum. I p to the gates ihev ca me a white, si'ent-movinr? crowd. Halt ! fialute ! i p vent right hands to the brow—so tliev paid honour to the dead. Tattle groups of people collected. White and brown mixed up, fraternised, and ex change i stories to the credit of die man people mourned. Presently there was a stir on Ihe verandah. Gradually from amidst the trees came the casket’ carried on a platform on the shoulders of many men. Cloth beaten from the bod,- of tree decorated the bier. Mats of fine texture hung about the po'Ched -are; gay scarlet hibiscus blooms crowned all. Boon!, boom, boom, sounded the drum. The a roe! > shuffled and fell into line behind the bind. The snn blazed, there was not a. breath of wind : everything was quiet and urinnturallv still. Down the grassy street, on to the beach between an avenue of coco palms straggled the people. Boom boom, boom, clashed the drum, and in the distance bells tolled softly. The black-garbed ministers waited in the midst of palm-shaded mounds, waited for the corning of the big chief. The bier was laid beside a concrete vault. The people scattered around the mounds reverently seated themselves, as is the custom of Tonga, for no one may stand in the presence of a chief even though ha

be dead. In turns the ministers read the service, the “man that is born of woman,” the “dust to dust"’; the band played, the choir of students chanted. lhe clergy bowed and vanished amidst the palms. The crowd shrailed, adjusted lava-lavas, stood up, looked at the mat-covered coffin, and took short cuts over the heaps of earth away from the place where the big chief lay. b lhe band played a quickstep and marched brisk.y. Girls laughed, plucked oleander, and decorated their hair. The few white men wiped away the perspiration;—the chief had passed'. PALOLO : SEA MYSTERY. A marine worm that times its movements to a nicety rounds like a mvtli, but such is the case with the Palolo, which appears on the surface of tropic waters two nights in a year. The natives are definite that it is a worm floating round in a kind of jelly. Other authorities say it is not a worm at all, but a growth thrown off by a worm found in al: coral eras. The worm lies all the year round in cracks of certain reefs at no great depth below the surface, and the floating palolo is part of this larger worm which, under some mysterious influence, is thrown off one day a year. Whatever it is, when fried it makes excellent eating. NATIVE CALCULATION. The Samoan natives used to have a peculiar method ~f timing the coming <,f the palolo. The chief man of the village had a- basket hung on the rafters, nine red and green feathers, three leaves, and nine black stones, loach day he dropped a stone m the basket, and on the tenth aU -were turned out and a feather put in their place. On the hundredth lay nine feathers and nine stones were turned out and a leaf put in their place. When the basket neb] three leaves, five feathers, and four stones the palolo was due next mornrng. three hundred and fifty four (fires is the interval between their coming for two y ears : then it is necessarv i.o reckon 380 days for a similar period of time. Pa’olo is found throughout the Pacific, and great preparations are always made by the natives as the time grows near for its appearance. The surface of the sea is covered with the worm, and no more labour is required for its catching than if one were scooping up a bucket of water. SACRED FLYING FOXES. The feature of I-Imifo, a small village in Tonga, is the flying-fox colony, which tne natives carefully protect from interference. Four or five great iron-wood trees stand in the village square, and many thousands of huge fruit-eating bats most there in the sunshine, hanging head downwards, crawang, scratching, quarrelling, killing the foliage, and poisoning the an' with their foul reek. At nightfall taey set forth in long processions for the banana plantations levying toll on them as far distant as 15 miles and returning to their perch before daybreak. The Toucans have a belief that dire calamity will belall the little kingdom if the creatures are interfered with in anv way. Outside the village they may be shot, but nothin? would attempt a Tongan to kill one within the colony. With a wing-spread up to 2ft, they present an excellent'flying target on moonlight nights. A NATURAL LUMIXANT. 1 have seen the candle-nut used as a lnniimrnt in the Islands. It is the women’s duty to collect the ripe nuts, husk them, and heat the hard shell to facilitate the removal of the kerne. 1 in its entirety. The mid rib of a cocoanut frond is used to skewer some 20 of these kernels, and three skewerfuls tied with a strip of hibiscus bark make quite a good torch. When used in the huts the women tend t’-e light by knocking off the burned black residue. The smell of burning candle nut is like nothing on earth. The tree is of highly- ornate growth, producing prolific eiops. of nuts similar in size and appearance to walnuts. The kernels are rich in fine oil. but the labour involved in gather mg and enuhing militates against candlenut becoming an active competitor with copra.