Chapter X: The Story of Shipwreck (1)

I

In this chapter an account will be given of the ideas and beliefs associated with shipwreck, and of the various precautions which the natives take to insure their own safety. We shall find here a strange mixture of definite, matter of fact information, and of fantastic superstitions. Taking a critical, ethnographic side view, it may be said directly that the fanciful elements are intertwined with the realities in such a manner, that it is difficult to make a distinction between what is mere mytho-poetic fiction and what is a customary rule of behaviour, drawn from actual experience. The best way of presenting this material will be to give a consecutive account of a shipwreck, as it is told in Kiriwinian villages by the travelled old men to the younger generation. I shall adduce in it the several magical formulæ, the rules of behaviour, the part played by the miraculous fish, and the complex ritual of the saved party as they flee from the pursuing mulukwausi.

These--the flying witches--will play such an important part in the account, that I must begin with a detailed description of the various beliefs referring to them, though the subject has been touched upon once or twice before (Chapter II, Division VII, and other places). The sea and sailing upon it are intimately associated in the mind of a Boyowan with these women. They had to be mentioned in the description of canoe magic, and we shall see what an important part they play in the legends of canoe building. In his sailing, whether he goes to Kitava or further East, or whether he travels South to the Amphletts and Dobu, they form one of the main preoccupations of a Boyowan sailor. For they are not only dangerous to him, but to a certain extent, foreign. Boyowa, with the exception of Wawela and one or two other villages on the Eastern coast, and in the South of the island, is an ethnographic district, where the flying witches do not exist, although they visit it from time to time. Whereas all the surrounding tribes are full of women who practice this form of sorcery. Thus sailing South, the Boyowan is travelling straight into the heart of their domain.

These women have the power of making themselves invisible, and flying at night through the air. The orthodox belief is that a woman who is a yoyova can send forth a double which is invisible at will, but may appear in the form of a flying fox or of a night bird or a firefly. There is also a belief that a yoyova develops within her a something, shaped like an egg, or like a young, unripe coco-nut. This something is called as a matter of fact kapuwana, which is the word for a small coco-nut. [67] This idea remains in the native's mind in a vague, indefinite, undifferentiated form, and any attempt to elicit a more detailed definition by asking him such questions, as to whether the kapuwana is a material object or not, would be to smuggle our own categories into his belief, where they do not exist. The kapuwana is anyhow believed to be the something which in the nightly flights leaves the body of the yoyova and assumes the various forms in which the mulukwausi appears. Another variant of the belief about the yoyova is, that those who know their magic especially well, can fly themselves, bodily transporting themselves through the air.

But it can never be sufficiently emphasised that all these beliefs cannot be treated as consistent pieces of knowledge; they flow into one another, and even the same native probably holds several views rationally inconsistent with one another. Even their terminology (compare the last Division of the foregoing chapter), cannot be taken as implying a strict distinction or definition. Thus, the word yoyova is applied to the woman as we meet her in the village, and the word mulukwausi will be used when we see something suspicious flying through the air. But it would be incorrect to systematise this use into a sort of doctrine and to say: "An individual woman is conceived as consisting of an actual living personality called yoyova, and of an immaterial, spiritual principle called mulukwausi, which in its potential form is the kapuwana." In doing this we would do much what the Mediæval Scholastics did to the living faith of the early ages. The native feels and fears his belief rather than formulates it clearly to himself. He uses terms and expressions, and thus, as used by him, we must collect them as documents of belief, but abstain from working them out into a consistent theory; for this represents neither the native's mind nor any other form of reality.

As we remember from Chapter II, the flying witches are a nefarious agency, second in importance to the bwaga'u (male sorcerer), but in efficiency far more deadly even than he himself. In contrast to the bwaga'u, who is simply a man in possession of a special form of magic, the yoyova have to be gradually initiated into their status. Only a small child, whose mother is a witch, can become a witch herself. When a witch gives birth to a female child, she medicates a piece of obsidian, and cuts off the navel string. The navel string is then buried, with the recital of a magical formula, in the house, and not, as is done in all ordinary cases, in the garden. Soon after, the witch will carry her daughter to the sea beach, utter a spell over some brine in a coco-nut cup, and give the child to drink. After that, the child is submerged in water and washed, a kind of witch's baptism! Then she brings back the baby into the house, utters a spell over a mat, and folds her up in it. At night, she carries the baby through the air, and goes to a trysting place of other yoyova, where she presents her child ritually to them. In contrast to the usual custom of young mothers of sleeping over a small fire, a sorceress lies with her baby in the cold. As the child grows up, the mother will take it into her arms and carry it through the air on her nightly rounds. Entering girlhood at the age when the first grass skirt is put on a maiden, the little prospective witch will begin to fly herself.

Another system of training, running side by side with flying, consists in accustoming the child to participation in human flesh. Even before the growing witch will begin to fly on her own account, the mother will take her to the ghoulish repasts, where she and other witches sit over a corpse, eating its eyes, tongue, lungs, and entrails. There the little girl receives her first share of corpse flesh, and trains her taste to like this diet.

There are other forms of training ascribed to mothers solicitous that their daughters should grow up into efficient yoyova and mulukwausi. At night the mother will stand on one side of the hut, with the child in her hands, and throw the little one over the roof. Then quickly, with the speed only possible to a yoyova, she will move round, and catch the child on the other side. This happens before the child begins to fly, and is meant to accustom it to passing rapidly through the air. Or again, the child will be held by her feet, head down, and remain in this position while the mother utters a spell. Thus gradually, by all these means, the child acquires the powers and tastes of a yoyova.

It is easy to pick out such girls from other children. They will be recognisable by their crude tastes, and more especially by their habit of eating raw flesh of pigs or uncooked fish. And here we come to a point, where mythical superstition plays over into something more real, for I have been assured by reliable informants, and those not only natives, that there are cases of girls who will show a craving for raw meat, and when a pig is being quartered in the village will drink its blood and tear up its flesh. These statements I never could verify by direct observations, and they may be only the result of very strong belief projecting its own realities, as we see on every side in our own society in miraculous cures, spiritistic phenomena, etc., etc. If, however, the eating of raw flesh by girl children really occurs, this simply means that they play up to what they know is said and believed about them. This again is a phenomenon of social psychology met with in many phases of Trobriand society and in our own.

This does not mean that the character of a yoyova is publicly donned. Indeed, though a man often owns up to the fact that he is a bwaga'u, and treats his speciality quite openly in conversation, a woman will never directly confess to being a yoyova, not even to her own husband. But she will certainly be marked by everyone as such a one, and she will often play up to the rôle, for it is always an advantage to be supposed to be endowed with supernatural powers. And moreover, being a sorceress is also a good source of income. A woman will often receive presents with the understanding that such and such a person has to be injured. She will openly take gifts, avowedly in payment for healing someone who has been hurt by another witch. Thus the character of a yoyova is, in a way, a public one, and the most important and powerful witches will be enumerated by name. But no woman will ever openly speak about being one. Of course to have such a character would in no way spoil matrimonial chances, or do anything but enhance the social status of a woman.

So deep is the belief in the efficacy of magic, and in magic being the only means of acquiring extraordinary faculties, that all powers of a yoyova are attributed to magic. As we saw in the training of a young yoyova, magic has to be spoken at every stage in order to impart to her the character of a witch. A full blown yoyova has to utter special magic each time she wishes to be invisible, or when she wants to fly, or acquire higher speed, or penetrate darkness and distance in order to find out whether an accident is happening there. But like everything referring to this form of witchcraft, these formulæ never come to light. Although I was able to acquire a whole body of spells of the bwaga'u sorcery, I could not even lift the fringe of the impenetrable veil, surrounding the magic of the yoyova. As a matter of fact, there is not the slightest doubt for me that not one single rite, not one single word of this magic, have ever existed.

Once a mulukwausi is fully trained in her craft, she will often go at night to feed on corpses or to destroy shipwrecked mariners, for these are her two main pursuits. By a special sense, acquired through magic, she can 'hear,' as the natives say, that a man has died at such and such a place, or that a canoe is in danger. Even a young apprenticed yoyova will have her hearing so sharpened that she will tell her mother: "Mother, I hear, they cry!" Which means that a man is dead or dying at some place. Or she will say: "Mother, a waga is sinking!" And then they both will fly to the spot.

When she goes out on such an errand, the yoyova leaves her body behind. Then she climbs a tree, and reciting some magic, she ties a creeper to it. Then, she flies off, along this creeper, which snaps behind her. This is the moment when we see the fire flying through the sky. Whenever the natives see a falling star, they know it is a mulukwausi on her flight. Another version is that, when a mulukwausi recites a certain spell, a tree which stands somewhere near her destination bends down towards the other tree on which she is perched. She jumps from one top to the other, and it is then that we see the fire. According to some versions, the mulukwausi, that is, the witch in her flying state, moves about naked, leaving her skirt round the body, which remains asleep in the hut. Other versions depict her as tying her skirt tightly round her when flying, and beating her buttocks with a magical pandanus streamer. These latter versions are embodied in the magic quoted above in Chapter V.

Arrived at the place where lies the corpse, the mulukwausi, with others who have also flown to the spot, perches on some high object, the top of a tree or the gable of a hut. There they all wait till they can feast on the corpse, and such is their greed and appetite that they are also very dangerous to living men. People who collect round the dead body to mourn and wake over it often have a special spell against the mulukwausi recited over them, by the one who knows it. They are careful not to stray away from the others, and, during burial of the dead and afterwards, they believe the air to be infested with these dangerous witches, who spread the smell of carrion around them.

The mulukwausi will eat out the eyes, the tongue, and the 'insides' (lopoula) of the corpse; when they attack a living man they may simply hit him or kick him, and then he becomes more or less sick. But sometimes they get hold of an individual and treat him like a corpse and eat some of his organs, and then the man dies. It is possible to diagnose this, for such a person would quickly fail, losing his speech, his vision, sometimes suddenly being bereft of all power of movement. It is a less dangerous method to the living man when the mulukwausi instead of eating his 'insides' on the spot, simply remove them. They hide them in a place only known to themselves, in order to have provision for a future feast. In that case there is some hope for the victim. Another yoyova, summoned quickly by the relations of the dying and well paid by them, will, in the form of a mulukwausi, go forth, search for the missing organs, and, if she is fortunate enough to find and restore them, save the life of the victim.

Kenoriya, the favourite daughter of To'ulawa, the chief of Omarakana, while on a visit to another village, was deprived of her internal organs by the mulukwausi. When brought home, she could neither move nor speak, and lay down as if dead. Her mother and other relatives already began their mortuary wailing over her, the chief himself broke out into loud lamentations. But nevertheless, as a forlorn hope, they sent for a woman from Wawela, a well-known yoyova, who after receiving valuables and food, flew out as a mulukwausi, and the very next night found Kenoriya's insides somewhere in the raybwag, near the beach of Kaulukuba, and restored her to health.

Another authentic story is that of the daughter of a Greek trader and a Kiriwinian woman from Oburaku. This story was told me by the lady herself, in perfectly correct English, learnt in one of the white settlements of New Guinea, where she had been brought up in the house of a leading missionary. But the story was not spoilt by any scepticism; it was told with perfect simplicity and conviction.

When she was a little girl, a woman called Sewawela, from the Island of Kitava, but married to a man of Wawela, came to her parents' house and wanted to sell a mat. They did not buy it, and gave her only a little food, which, as she was a renowned yoyova and accustomed therefore to deferential treatment, made her angry. When night came, the little one was playing on the beach in front of the house, when the parents saw a big firefly hovering about the child. The insect then flew round the parents and went into the room. Seeing that there was something strange about the firefly, they called the girl and put her to bed at once. But she fell ill immediately, could not sleep all night, and the parents, with many native attendants, had to keep watch over her. Next morning, added the Kiriwinian mother, who was listening to her daughter telling me the tale, the girl "boge ikarige; kukula wala ipipisi," "she was dead already, but her heart was still beating." All the women present broke out into the ceremonial lamentations. The father of the girl's mother, however, went to Wawela, and got hold of another yoyova, called Bomrimwari. She took some herbs and smeared her own body all over. Then she went out in the form of a mulukwausi in search of the girl's lopoulo (inside). She searched about and found it in the hut of Sewawela, where it lay on the shelf on which are kept the big clay-pots, in which the mona (taro pudding), is cooked ceremonially. There it lay "red as calico." Sewawela had left it there, while she went into the garden with her husband, meaning to eat it on her return. Had this happened, the girl could not have been saved. As soon as Bomrimwari found it, she made some magic over it then and there. Then she came back to the trader's compound, made some more magic over ginger-root, and water, and caused the lopoulo to return to its place. After that, the little girl soon got better. A substantial payment was given by the parents to the yoyova for saving their child.

Living in Oburaku, a village on the Southern half of Boyowa, I was on the boundary between the district where the yoyova do not exist, and the other one, to the East, where they are plentiful. On the other side of the Island, which is very narrow at this part, is the village of Wawela, where almost every woman is reputed to be a witch, and some are quite notorious. Going over the raybwag at night, the natives of Oburaku would point out certain fireflies which would suddenly disappear, not to relight again. These were the mulukwausi. Again, at night, swarms of flying foxes used to flap over the tall trees, making for the big, swampy Island of Boymapo'u which closes in the Lagoon opposite the village. These too were mulukwausi, travelling from the East, their real home. They also used to perch on the tops of the trees growing on the water's edge, and this was therefore an especially dangerous spot after sunset. I was often warned not to sit there on the platforms of the beached canoes, as I liked to do, watching the play of colours on the smooth, muddy waters, and on the bright mangroves. When I fell ill soon after, everybody decided that I had been 'kicked' by the mulukwausi, and some magic was performed over me by my friend Molilakwa, the same who gave me some formulæ of kayga'u, the magic spoken at sea against witches. In this case his efforts were entirely successful, and my quick recovery was attributed by the natives solely to the spells.

II

What interests us most about mulukwausi, is their association with the sea and shipwreck. Very often they will roam over the sea, and meet at a trysting place on a reef. There they will partake of a special kind of coral, broken off from a reef, a kind called by the natives nada. This whets their appetite for human flesh, exactly as the drinking of salt water does with the bwaga'u. They have also some indirect power over the elements in the sea. Although the natives do not quite agree on the point, there is no doubt that a definite connection exists between the mulukwausi and all the other dangers which may be met in the sea, such as sharks, the 'gaping depth' (ikapwagega wiwitu), many of the small sea animals, crabs, some of the shells and the other things to be mentioned presently, all of which are considered to be the cause of death of drowning men. Thus the belief is quite definite that, in being cast into the water by the shipwreck, men do not meet any real danger except by being eaten by the mulukwausi, the sharks, and the other animals. If by the proper magic these influences can be obviated, the drowning men will escape unscathed. The belief in the omnipotence of man, or rather, woman in this case, and of the equal power in antidoting by magic, governs all the ideas of these natives about shipwreck. The supreme remedy and insurance against any dangers lies in the magic of mist, called kayga'u, which, side by side with Kula magic, and the magic of the canoes, is the third of the indispensable magical equipments of a sailor.

A man who knows well the kayga'u is considered to be able to travel safely through the most dangerous seas. A renowned chief, Maniyuwa, who was reputed as one of the greatest masters in kayga'u as well as in other magic, died in Dobu on an expedition about two generations ago. His son, Maradiana, had learnt his father's kayga'u. Although the mulukwausi are extremely dangerous in the presence of a corpse, and though the natives would never dream of putting a dead body on a canoe, and thus multiplying the probabilities of an attack by the witches, still, Maradiana, trusting to his kayga'u, brought the corpse back to Boyowa without mishap. This act, a testimony to the daring sailor's great prowess, and to the efficiency of the kayga'u magic, is kept alive in the memory and tradition of the natives. One of my informants, boasting of his kayga'u, told me how once, on a return from Dobu, he performed his rites. Such a mist arose as a consequence of it that the rest of the canoes lost their way, and arrived in the island of Kayleula. Indeed, if we can speak of a belief being alive, that is, of having a strong hold over human imagination, the belief in the danger from mulukwausi at sea is emphatically such a one. In times of mental stress, in times of the slightest danger at sea, or when a dying or dead person is near, the natives at once respond emotionally in terms of this belief. No one could live among these natives, speaking their language, and following their tribal life, without constantly coming up against the belief in mulukwausi, and in the efficiency of the kayga'u.

As in all other magic, also here, there are various systems of kayga'u, that is, there are various formulæ, slightly differing in their expressions, though usually similar in their fundamental wordings and in certain 'key' expressions. In each system, there are two main types of spells, the giyotanawa, or the kayga'u of the Underneath, and the giyorokaywa, or the kayga'u of the Above. The first one usually consists of a short formula or formulæ spoken over some stones and some lime in a lime pot and over some ginger root. This giyotanawa, as its name indicates, is magic directed against the evil agencies, awaiting the drowning men from below. Its spells close up 'the gaping depth' and they screen off the shipwrecked men from the eyes of the sharks. They also protect them from the other evil things, which cause the death of a man in drowning. The several little sea worms found on the beach, the crabs, the poisonous fish, soka, and the spiky fish, baiba'i, as well as the jumping stones, whether vineylida or nu'akekepaki, are all warded off and blinded by the giyotanawa. Perhaps the most extraordinary belief in this connection is that the tokwalu, the carved human figures on the prow boards, the guwaya, the semi-human effigy on the mast top, as well as the canoe ribs would 'eat' the drowning men if not magically 'treated.'

The kayga'u of the 'Above,' the giyorokaywa, consists of long spells, recited over some ginger root, on several occasions before sailing, and during bad weather or shipwreck. They are directed exclusively against the mulukwausi, and form therefore the more important class of the two. These spells must never be recited at night, as then the mulukwausi could see and hear the man, and make his magic inefficient. Again, the spell of the Above, when recited at sea, must be spoken so that the magician is not covered with spray, for if his mouth were wet with sea water, the smell would attract rather than disperse, the flying witches. The man who knows the kayga'u must also be very careful at meal times. Children may not speak, play about, or make any noise while he eats, nor should anyone go round him behind his back while he is thus engaged; normay they point out anything with the finger. Should the man be thus disturbed during his food, he would have to stop eating at once, and not resume it till the next meal time.

Now the leading idea of kayga'u is that it produces some sort of mist. The mulukwausi who follow the canoe, the sharks and live stones which lie in wait for it, the depth with all its horror, and the débris of the canoe ready to harm the owner, all these are blinded by the mist that arises in obedience to these spells. Thus the paralysing effect of these two main forms of magic and the specialised sphere of influence of each of them, are definite and clear dogmas of native belief.

But here again we must not try to press the interpretation of these dogmas too far. Some sort of mist covers the eyes of all the evil agencies or blinds them; it makes the natives invisible from them. But to ask whether the kayga'u produces a real mist, visible also to man, or only a supernatural one, visible only to the mulukwausi; or whether it simply blinds their eyes so that they see nothing, would be asking too much. The same native who will boast of having produced a real mist, so great that it led astray his companions, will next day perform the kayga'u in the village during a burial, and affirm that the mulukwausi are in a mist, though obviously a perfectly clear atmosphere surrounds the whole proceedings. The natives will tell how, sailing on a windy but clear day, after a kayga'u has been recited into the eye of the wind, they hear the shrieks of the mulukwausi, who, losing their companions and the scent of the trail, hail one another in the dark. Again, some expressions seem to represent the view that it is mainly an action on the eyes of the witches. 'Idudubila matala mulukwausi,'--'It darkens the eyes of the mulukwausi,' or 'iguyugwayu'--'It blinds,' the natives will say. And when asked:

"What do the mulukwausi see, then?" they will answer: "They will
see mist only. They do not see the places, they do not see the men,
only mist."

Thus here, as in all cases of belief, there is a certain latitude, within which the opinions and views may vary, and only the broad outline, which surrounds them, is definitely fixed by tradition, embodied in ritual, and expressed by the phraseology of magical formulæ or by the statements of a myth.

I have thus defined the manner in which the natives face the dangers of the sea; we have found, that the fundamental conceptions underlying this attitude are, that in shipwreck, men are entirely in the hands of the witches, and that from this, only their own magical defence can save them. This defence consists in the rites and formulæ of the kayga'u, of which we have also learnt the leading principles. Now, a consecutive description must be given of how this magic is performed when a toliwaga sets out on an expedition. And following up this expedition, it must be told how the natives imagine a shipwreck, and what they believe the behaviour of the shipwrecked party would be.

III

I shall give this narrative in a consecutive manner, as it was told to me by some of the most experienced and renowned Trobriand sailors in Sinaketa, Oburaku, and Omarakana. We can imagine that exactly such a narrative would be told by a veteran toliwaga to his usagelu on the beach of Yakum, as our Kula party sit round the camp fires at night. One of the old men, well-known for the excellence of his kayga'u, and boastful of it, would tell his story, entering minutely into all the details, however often the others might have heard about them before, or even assisted at the performance of his magic. He would then proceed to describe, with extreme realism, and dwelling graphically on every point, the story of a shipwreck, very much as if he had gone through one himself. As a matter of fact, no one alive at present has had any personal experience of such a catastrophe, though many have lived through frequent narrow escapes in stormy weather. Based on this, and on what they have heard themselves of the tradition of shipwrecks, natives will tell the story with characteristic vividness. Thus, the account given below is not only a summary of native belief, it is an ethnographic document in itself, representing the manner in which such type of narrative would be told over camp fires, the same subject being over and over again repeated by the same man, and listened to by the same audience, exactly as we, when children, or the peasants of Eastern Europe, will hearken to familiar fairy tales and Märchen. The only deviation here from what would actually take place in such a story-telling, is the insertion of magical formulæ into the narrative. The speaker might indeed repeat his magic, were he speaking in broad daylight, in his village, to a group of close kinsmen and friends. But being on a small island in the middle of the ocean, and at night, the recital of spells would be a taboo of the kayga'u; nor would a man ever recite his magic before a numerous audience, except on certain occasions at mortuary vigils, where people are expected to chant their magic aloud before hundreds of listeners.

Returning then again to our group of sailors, who sit under the stunted pandanus trees of Yakum, let us listen to one of the companions of the daring Maradiana, now dead, to one of the descendants of the great Maniyuwa. He will tell us how, early in the morning, on the day of departure from Sinaketa, or sometimes on the next morning, when they leave Muwa, he performs the first rite of kayga'u. Wrapping up a piece of leyya (wild ginger root) in a bit of dried banana leaf, he chants over it the long spell of the giyorokaywa, the kayga'u of the Above. He chants this spell into the leaf, holding it cup-shaped, with the morsel of ginger root at the bottom, so that the spell might enter into the substance to be medicated. After that, the leaf is immediately wrapped round, so as to imprison the magical virtue, and the magician ties the parcel round his left arm, with a piece of bast or string. Sometimes he will medicate two bits of ginger and make two parcels, of which the other will be placed in a string necklet, and carried on his breast. Our narrator, who is the master of one of the canoes, will probably not be the only one within the circle round the camp fire, who carries these bundles of medicated ginger; for though a toliwaga must always perform this rite as well as know all the other magic of shipwreck, as a rule several of the older members of his crew also know it, and have also prepared their magical bundles.

This is one of the spells of the giyorokaywa, such as the old man said over the ginger root:

GIYOROKAYWA NO. 1 (LEYYA KAYGA'U).

"I will befog Muyuwa!" (repeated). "I will befog
Misima!" (repeated). "The mist springs up; the mist makes them
tremble. I befog the front, I shut off the rear; I befog the
rear, I shut off the front. I fill with mist, mist springs up;
I fill with mist, the mist which makes them tremble."

This is the opening part of the formula, very clear, and easy to
be translated. The mist is magically invoked, the word for mist
being repeated with several verbal combinations, in a rhythmic and
alliterative manner. The expression tremble, maysisi, refers to
a peculiar belief, that when a sorcerer or sorceress approaches
the victim, and this man paralyses them with a counter spell,
they lose their bearings, and stand there trembling.

The main part of this spell opens up with the word 'aga'u,' 'I
befog,' which, like all such leading words of a spell is first of
all intoned in a long, drawn-out chant, and then quickly repeated
with a series of words. Then the word 'aga'u' is replaced by 'aga'u
sulu,' 'I befog, lead astray,' which in its turn makes way for,
'aga'u boda,' 'I befog, shut off.' The list of words repeated
in succession with each of these three expressions is a long
one. It is headed by the words 'the eyes of the witches.' Then,
'the eyes of the sea-crab.' Then, always with the word 'eyes,'
the animals, worms and insects which threaten drowning men in the
sea, are enumerated. After they are exhausted, the various parts
of the body are repeated; then finally, a long list of villages
is recited, preceded by the word aga'u, forming phrases such as:
"I befog the eyes of the women of Wawela, etc."

Let us reconstruct a piece of this middle part in a consecutive
manner. "I befog ...! I befog, I befog, the eyes of the witches! I
befog the eyes of the little crabs! I befog the eyes of the hermit
crab! I befog the eyes of the insects on the beach! ... etc."

"I befog the hand, I befog the foot, I befog the head. I befog
the shoulders ... etc."

"I befog the eyes of the women of Wawela; I befog the eyes of the
women of Kaulasi; I befog the eyes of the women of Kumilabwaga,
I befog the eyes of the women of Vakuta ... etc., etc."

"I befog, lead astray, the eyes of the witches; I befog, lead
astray the eyes of the little crab! ... etc."

"I befog, shut off the eyes of the witches, I befog, shut off
the eyes of the little crab ... etc., etc."

It can easily be seen how long drawn such a spell is, especially
as in this middle part, the magician will often come back to where
he has started, and repeat the leading word over and over again
with the others. Indeed, this can be taken as a typical tapwana,
or middle part, of a long spell, where the leading words are,
so to speak, well rubbed into the various other expressions. One
feature of this middle part is remarkable, namely, that the
beings from below, the crabs, the sea insects and worms are
invoked, although the spell is one of the giyorokaywa type,
the magic of the Above. This is an inconsistency frequently met
with; a contradiction between the ideas embodied in the spell,
and the theory of the magic, as explicitly formulated by the
informants. The parts of the body enumerated in the tapwana
refer to the magician's own person, and to his companions in the
canoe. By this part of the spell, he surrounds himself and all
his companions with mist, which makes them invisible to all the
evil influences.

After the long tapwana has been recited, there follows the last
part, which, however, is not chanted in this case, but spoken in
a low, persuasive, tender voice.

"I hit thy flanks; I fold over thy mat, thy bleached mat of
pandanus; I shall make it into thy mantle. I take thy sleeping
doba (grass skirt), I cover thy loins; remain there, snore within
thy house! I alone myself" (here the reciter's name is uttered)
"I shall remain in the sea, I shall swim!"

This last part throws some interesting sidelights on native belief in mulukwausi. We see here the expression of the idea that the body of the witch remains in the house, whilst she herself goes out on her nefarious errand. Molilakwa, the magician of Oburaku who gave me this spell, said in commentary to this last part:

"The yoyova casts off her body (inini wowola--which really means
'peals off her skin'); she lies down and sleeps, we hear her
snoring. Her covering (kapwalela that is, her outward body,
her skin) remains in the house, and she herself flies (titolela
biyova). Her skirt remains in the house, she flies naked. When
she meets men, she eats us. In the morning, she puts on her body,
and lies down in her hut. When we cover her loins with the doba,
she cannot fly any more."

This last sentence refers to the magical act of covering, as expressed in the last part of the spell.

Here we find another variant of belief as to the nature of the mulukwausi, to be added to those mentioned before. Previously we met the belief of the disassociation of the woman into the part that remains, and the part that flies. But here the real personality is located in the flying part, whereas what remains is the 'covering.' To imagine the mulukwausi, the flying part, as a 'sending,' in the light of this belief, would not be correct. In general, such categories as 'agent,' and 'sending,' or as 'real self' and 'emanation' etc., etc., can be applied to native belief as rough approximations only, and the exact definition should be given in terms of native statement.

The final sentence of this spell, containing the wish to remain alone in the sea, to be allowed to swim and drift, is a testimony to the belief that without mulukwausi, there is no danger to a man adrift on a piece of wreckage among the foaming waves of a stormy sea.

After reciting this lengthy spell, the toliwaga, as he tells us in his narrative, has had to perform another rite, this time, over his lime-pot. Taking out the stopper of rolled palm leaf and plaited fibre from the baked and decorated gourd in which he keeps his lime, he utters another spell of the giyorokaywa cycle:

GIYOROKAYWA NO. 2 (PWAKA KAYGA'U).

"There on Muruwa, I arise, I stand up! Iwa, Sewatupa, at
the head--I rumble, I disperse. Kasabwaybwayreta, Namedili,
Toburitolu, Tobwebweso, Tauva'u, Bo'abwa'u, Rasarasa. They are
lost, they disappear."

This beginning, full of archaic expressions, implicit meanings
and allusions and personal names, is very obscure. The first
words refer probably to the head-quarters of sorcery; Muruwa
(or Murua--Woodlark Island), Iwa, Sewatupa. The long list of
personal names following afterwards contains some mythical ones,
like Kasabwaybwayreta, and some others, which I cannot explain,
though the words Tobwebweso, Tauva'u, and Bo'abwa'u suggest that
this is a list in which some sorcerers' names figure. As a rule,
in such spells, a list of names signifies that all those who have
used and handed down this formula, are enumerated. In some cases
the people mentioned are frankly mythical heroes. Sometimes a
few mythical names are chanted, and then comes a string of actual
people, forming a sort of pedigree of the spell. If these in this
spell are ancestor names they all refer to mythical personalities,
and not to real ancestors. [68] The last words contained an
expression typical of the kayga'u. Then comes the middle part.

"I arise, I escape from bara'u; I arise, I escape from yoyova. I
arise, I escape from mulukwausi. I arise, I escape from bowo'u,
etc.," repeating the leading words "I arise, I escape from--"
with the words used to describe the flying witches in the various
surrounding districts. Thus the word bara'u comes from Muyuwa
(Woodlark Island), where it describes the sorceress, and not,
as in other Massim districts, a male sorcerer. The words yoyova,
mulukwausi need no explanation. Bowo'u is an Amphlettan word. Words
from Dobu, Tubetube, etc., follow. Then the whole period is
repeated, adding 'eyes of' in the middle of each phrase, so that
it runs:

"I arise, I escape from the eyes of the bara'u. I arise, I escape
from the eyes of the yoyova, etc." The leading words, 'I arise,
I escape from' are then replaced by: 'They wander astray,' which,
again, make way to 'the sea is cleared off.' This whole middle
part of the spell is clear, and needs no commentary. Then comes
the concluding period (dogina):

"I am a manuderi (small bird), I am a kidikidi (small sea bird),
I am a floating log, I am a piece of sea-weed; I shall produce
mist till it encloses all, I shall befog, I shall shut off with
fog. Mist, enveloped in mist, dissolving in mist am I. Clear is
the sea, (the mulukwausi are) straying in mist." This part also
needs no special commentary.

This is again a long spell of the giyorokaywa type, that is, directed against the mulukwausi, and in this the spell is consistent, for the mulukwausi alone are invoked in the middle period.

After the spell has been chanted into the lime pot, this is well stoppered, and not opened till the end of the journey. It must be noted that these two giyorokaywa spells have been spoken by our toliwaga in the village or on Muwa beach, and in day time. For, as said above, it is a taboo to utter them in the night or at sea. From the moment he has spoken these two spells, both medicated substances, the ginger root and the lime in the lime pot, remain near him. He has also in the canoe some stones of those brought from the Koya, and called binabina, in distinction to the dead coral, which is called dakuna. Over these stones, at the moment of the occurrence of danger, a spell of the Underneath, a giyotanawa will be recited. The following is a formula of this type, short as they always are.

GIYOTANAWA NO. 1 (DAKUNA KAYGA'U).

"Man, bachelor, woman, young girl; woman, young girl, man,
bachelor! Traces, traces obliterated by cobwebs; traces,
obliterated by turning up (the material in which they were
left); I press, I close down! Sharks of Dukutabuya, I press,
I close down; Sharks of Kaduwaga, I press, I close down," etc.,
the sharks of Muwa, Galeya, Bonari, and Kaulokoki being invoked
in turn. All these words are names of marked parts of the sea,
in and around the Trobriand Lagoon. The formula ends up with
the following peroration: "I press down thy neck, I open up thy
passage of Kiyawa, I kick thee down, O shark. Duck down under
water, shark. Die, shark, die away."

The commentary to the opening sentences given by my informant, Molilakwa of Oburaku, was:

"This magic is taught to people when they are quite young. Hence
the mention of young people."

The obliterating of traces will be made clearer by the account which follows, in which we shall see that to obliterate traces, to put off the scent the shark and mulukwausi are the main concerns of the shipwrecked party. The middle part refers to sharks only, and so does the peroration. The passage of Kiyawa near Tuma is mentioned in several types of magical exorcisms, when the evil influence is being banished. This passage lies between the main island and the island of Tuma, and leads into the unknown regions of the North-Western seas.

It will be best to quote here another formula of the giyotanawa type, and a very dramatic one. For this is the formula spoken at the critical moment of shipwreck. At the moment when the sailors decide to abandon the craft and to plunge into the sea, the toliwaga stands up in the canoe, and slowly turning round so as to throw his words towards all four winds, intones in a loud voice this spell:

GIYOTANAWA NO. 2.

"Foam, foam, breaking wave, wave! I shall enter into the breaking
wave, I shall come out from behind it. I shall enter from behind
into the wave, and I shall come out in its breaking foam!"

"Mist, gathering mist, encircling mist, surround, surround me!"

"Mist, gathering mist, encircling mist, surround, surround me,
my mast!

Mist, gathering mist, etc. ... surround me, the nose of my canoe.

Mist, etc. ... surround me, my sail,

Mist, etc. ... surround me, my steering oar,

Mist, etc. ... surround me, my rigging,

Mist, etc. ... surround me, my platform,"

And so on, enumerating one after the other all the parts of the
canoe and its accessories. Then comes the final part of the spell:

"I shut off the skies with mist; I make the sea tremble with mist;
I close up your mouth, sharks, bonubonu (small worms), ginukwadewo
(other worms). Go underneath and we shall swim on top."

Little is needed as a commentary to this magic. Its beginning is very clear, and singularly well depicts the situation in which it is uttered. The end refers directly to the primary aim of the magic, to the warding off of the Underneath, of the dangerous animals in the sea. The only ambiguity refers to the middle part, where the magical leading words of 'enveloping by mist' are associated with a list of names of the parts of the canoe. I am not certain whether this is to be interpreted, in the sense that the toliwaga wants to surround his whole canoe with mist so that it may not be seen by the sharks, etc., or whether, on the contrary, just on the verge of abandoning his canoe, and anxious to cut himself off from its various parts which may turn on him and 'eat him,' he therefore wants to surround each of them with mist so that it may be blinded. The latter interpretation fits the above-quoted belief that certain parts of the canoe, especially the carved human figures on the prow-board and the mast, the ribs of the canoe, and certain other parts of its construction, 'eat' the shipwrecked men. But again, in this spell, there are enumerated not certain parts, but every part, and that undoubtedly is not consistent with this belief, so the question must remain open.

IV

I have anticipated some of the events of the consecutive narrative of shipwreck, in order to give the two last mentioned magical formulæ first, and not to have to interrupt the tale of our toliwaga, to which we now return. We left it at the point where, having said his first two kayga'u formulæ over the ginger and into the lime pot, he embarks, keeping these two things handy, and putting some binabina stones within his reach. From here, his narrative becomes more dramatic. He describes the approaching storm:

NARRATIVE OF SHIPWRECK AND SALVAGE.

"The canoe sails fast; the wind rises; big waves come; the wind
booms, du-du-du-du.... The sails flutter; the lamina (outrigger)
rises high! All the usagelu crouch on the lamina. I speak magic to
calm the wind. The big spell of the Sim-sim. They know all about
yavata (North-Westerley Monsoon wind). They live in the eye of
the yavata. The wind abates not, not a little bit. It booms, it
gains strength, it booms loud du-du-du-du-du. All the usagelu are
afraid. The mulukwausi scream, u-ú, u-ú, u-ú, u; their voices are
heard in the wind. With the wind they scream and come flying. The
veva (sheet rope) is torn from the hands of the tokabinaveva. The
sail flutters freely in the wind; it is torn away. It flies
far into the sea; it falls on the waters. The waves break over
the canoe. I stand up. I take the binabina stones; I recite the
kayga'u over them, the giyotanawa, the spell of the Underneath. The
short spell, the very strong spell. I throw the stones into the
deep. They weigh down the sharks, the vineylida; they close the
Gaping Depth. The fish cannot see us. I stand up, I take my lime
pot; I break it. The lime I throw into the wind. It wraps us up
in mist. Such a mist that no one can see us. The mulukwausi lose
sight of us. We hear them shout near by. They shout u-û, u-û, u-û,
u. The sharks, the bonubonu, the soka do not see us; the water
is turbid. The canoe is swamped, the water is in it. It drifts
heavily, the waves break over us. We break the vatotuwa, (the
sticks joining the float to the platform). The lamina (outrigger
float) is severed; we jump from the waga; we catch hold of the
lamina. On the lamina we drift. I utter the great Kaytaria spell;
the big fish iraviyaka comes. It lifts us. It takes the lamina
on its back, and carries us. We drift, we drift, we drift."

"We approach a shore; the iraviyaka brings us there, the iraviyaka
puts us on the shallows. I take a stout pole, I lift it off;
I speak a spell. The iraviyaka turns back to the deep sea."

"We are all on the dayaga (fringing reef). We stand inwater. The
water is cold, we all shiver with cold. We do not go ashore. We
are afraid of the mulukwausi. They follow us ashore. They wait for
us ashore. I take a dakuna (piece of coral stone), I say a spell
over it. I throw the stone on the beach; it makes a big thud;
good; the mulukwausi are not there. We go ashore. Another time,
I throw a stone, we hear nothing: mulukwausi are on the beach;
they catch it; we hear nothing. We remain on the dayaga. I take
some leyya (ginger). I spit it at the beach. I throw another
stone. The mulukwausi do not see it. It falls down; we hear it. We
go ashore; we sit on the sand in a row. We sit in one row, one man
near another, as on the lamina (in the same order as they drifted
on the lamina). I make a charm over the comb; all the usagelu comb
their hair; they tease their hair a long time. They are very cold;
we do not make the fire. First, I put order on the beach; I take
the piece of leyya, I spit it over the beach. One time, when the
leyya is finished, I take some kasita leaves (the beach is always
full of these). I put them on the shore, I put a stone on them,
uttering a spell--afterwards, we make fire. All sit round and
warm themselves at the fire."

"At day time, we don't go to the village; the mulukwausi would
follow us. After dark, we go. Like on the lamina, we march in the
same order, one after the other. I go last; I chant a spell over
a libu plant. I efface our traces. I put the libu on our track;
I put the weeds together. I make the path confused. I say a charm
to the spider, that he might make a cobweb. I say a charm to the
bush-hen, that she might turn up the soil."

"We go to the village. We enter the village, we pass the main
place. No one sees us; we are in mist, we are invisible. We enter
the house of my veyola (maternal kinsman), he medicates some
leyya; he spits (magically) on all of us. The mulukwausi smell us;
they smell the salt water on our skins. They come to the house,
the house trembles. A big wind shakes the house, we hear big thuds
against the house. The owner of the house medicates the leyya and
spits over us; they cannot see us. A big fire is made in the house;
plenty of smoke fills the house. The leyya and the smoke blind
their eyes. Five days we sit in smoke, our skin smells of smoke;
our hair smells of smoke; the mulukwausi cannot smell us. Then
I medicate some water and coco-nut, the usagelu wash and annoint
themselves. They leave the house, they sit on the kaukweda (spot
before the house). The owner of the house chases them away. 'Go,
go to your wife;' we all go, we return to our houses."