Note 6 — Chapter XXI · The Remaining Branches and Offshoots of the Kula

One such offshoot of the Kula ring we met in the Trobriands, to wit, the expeditions from the Western village of Kavataria, and from the island of Kayleula, to the Koya of Fergusson and Goodenough. We shall begin with a brief account of these expeditions.6 The preparations are very much the same, as in Sinaketa. The canoes are built with more or less the same magic (cf. Chapter V), they are launched ceremonially and the trial run, the tasasoria, also takes place (Chapter VI). The island of Kayleula is by far the more important centre of canoe building. Whether some of the Kavataria canoes were not actually made in Kayleula and purchased by the Kavatarians in olden days, I do not definitely know, though I think this was the case. Nowadays, the community of Kavataria are completely absorbed by the pearling industry, and since about a generation ago have given up the expeditions, and even do not own any canoes. The collecting of trade articles, the magic performed over the lilava, the yawarapu, and the sulumwoya are the same as those described before (Chapter VII) except, that is, that there exists a different system of mwasila in the island of Kayleula, a system which was used also by the Kavatarians. It must be remembered in this connection that the natives of Kayleula did make Kula on a small scale with the Amphlettans, and that their mwasila was connected with the Kula.7 But the main object of the Kavatarian and Kayleulan mwasila was their non-Kula trade with the natives of Fergusson and Goodenough. This is quite clear from Mr. Gilmour’s account, and it was also corroborated by my informants. They told me that the mwasila is done because of the kavaylu’a (fine food) that is, of the sago and betel-nut and pigs, the main objects of their expedition: