Note (return) — LECTURE XVI

In Saa the dead are usually buried in a common cemetery; but when the flesh has decayed the bones are taken up and heaped on one side. But if the deceased was a very great man or a beloved father, his body is preserved for a time in his son's house, being hung up either in a canoe or in the carved effigy of a sword-fish. Very favourite children are treated in the same way. The corpse may be kept in this way for years. Finally, there is a great funeral feast, at which the remains are removed to the common burial-ground, but the skull and jawbone are detached from the skeleton and kept in the house enclosed in the hollow wooden figure of a bonito-fish. By means of these relics the survivors think that they can secure the aid of the powerful ghost. Sometimes the corpse and afterwards the skull and jawbone are preserved, not in the house of the deceased, but in the oha or public canoe-house, which so far becomes a sort of shrine or temple of the dead.569 At Santa Cruz in the Solomon Islands the corpse is buried in a very deep grave in the house. Inland they dig up the bones again to make arrow-heads; also they detach the skull and keep it in a chest in the house, saying that it is the man himself. They even set food before the skull, no doubt for the use of the ghost. Yet they imagine that the ghosts of the dead go to the great volcano Tamami, where they are burnt in the crater and thus being renewed stay in the fiery region. Nevertheless the souls of the dead also haunt the forests in Santa Cruz; on wet and dark nights the natives see them twinkling in the gloom like fire-flies, and at the sight they are sore afraid.570 So little consistent with itself is the creed of these islanders touching the state of the dead. At Bugotu in the island of Ysabel (one of the Solomon Islands) a chief is buried with his head near the surface and a fire is kept burning over the grave, in order that the skull may be taken up and preserved in the house of his successor. The spirit of the dead chief has now become a worshipful ghost, and an expedition is sent out to cut off and bring back human heads in his honour. Any person, not belonging to the place, whom the head-hunters come across will be killed by them and his or her skull added to the collection, which is neatly arranged on the shore. These ghastly trophies are believed to add fresh spiritual power (mana) to the ghost of the dead chief. Till they have been procured, the people of the place take care not to move about. The grave of the chief is built up with stones and sacrifices are offered upon it.571