In old people callosities frequently form on the hip and elbows, the
effect, probably, of sleeping on the ground. Scarification of the
affected part is a common mode of treating local inflammatory complaints.
Ligatures are also used, as for example, one across the forehead to
remove headache. A singular mode of treating various complaints consists
in attaching one end of a string to the patient, while the other is held
in the mouth of a second person, who scarifies his own gums at the same
time until they bleed, which is supposed to indicate that the bad blood
has passed from the sick to the sound person.

FUNERAL CEREMONIES.

With regard to the curious burial ceremonies of the Kowraregas, I regret
that I cannot be so explicit as might otherwise have been the case, as
Giaom's information on this subject, and on this only, was not written
down at the time. When the head of a family dies at Muralug, the body is
laid out upon a framework of sticks raised a foot from the ground, and is
there allowed to rot. A small hut is raised close by, and the nearest
relative of the deceased lives there, supplied with food by his friends,
until the head of the corpse becomes nearly detached by the process of
putrefaction, when it is removed and handed over to the custody of the
eldest wife. She carries it about with her in a bag during her widowhood,
accompanying the party of the tribe to which she belongs from place to
place. The body, or rather the headless skeleton, is then interred in a
shallow grave over which a mound is raised ornamented by wooden posts at
the corners painted red, with sometimes shells, and other decorations
attached to them, precisely such a one as that figured in the Voyage of
the Fly, volume 1 page 149. On the occasion of our visiting the grave in
question (at Port Lihou, on Muralug) Giaom told me that we were closely
watched by a party of natives who were greatly pleased that we did not