[Footnote 1: Gods supposed to come in Tongan canoes and foreign
vessels.]

[Footnote 2: The principal god of the family.]




CHAPTER IX.

CLOTHING.


In our last chapter we alluded to the food of the Samoans, and now
proceed to a description of their clothing, the materials of which it
is made, their modes of ornament, etc.

During the day a covering of _ti_ leaves _(Dracæna terminalis_) was
all that either sex thought necessary. "They sewed" _ti_ "leaves
together, and made themselves aprons." The men had a small one about a
foot square, the women had theirs made of longer _ti_ leaves, reaching
from the waist down below the knee, and made wide, so as to form a
girdle covering all round. They had no regular covering for any other
part of the body. Occasionally, during rain, they would tie a banana
leaf round the head for a cap, or hold one over them as an umbrella.
They made shades for the eyes of a little piece of plaited cocoa-nut
leaflet; and sometimes they made sandals of the plaited bark of the
_Hibiscus tiliaceus_, to protect the feet while fishing among the
prickly coral about the reef.