excitement, the perspiration streaming down, and their tongues
galloping over the rhyme at breathless speed. For a drum, they had two
or three contrivances. One, a log of wood six or eight feet long,
hollowed out from a narrow elongated opening on the upper surface; and
this they beat with a short stick or mallet. Another was a set of
bamboos, four feet long and downwards, arranged like a Pan's pipe,
having the open ends inclosed in a mat bag, and this bag they beat
with a stick. A third kind of drumming was effected by four or five
men, each with a bamboo open at the top and closed at the bottom, with
which, holding vertically, they beat the ground, or a stone or any
hard substance, and as the bamboos are of various lengths, they
emitted a variety of sounds. At these night-dances all kinds of
obscenity in looks, language, and gesture prevailed; and often they
danced and revelled till daylight.

_Court buffoons_ furnished some amusement at dancing and other
festivals, and also at public meetings. If a chief of importance went
to any of these assemblies he had in his train one or two humourists,
who, by oddity in dress, gait, or gesture, or by lascivious jokes,
tried to excite laughter.

_Boxing and fencing_ were common on festive days, and often led to
serious quarrels. In fencing, they used the stalk of the cocoa-nut
leaf as a substitute for a club. _Women_, as well as men, entered the
ring, and strove for the fame of a pugilist.

_Wrestling_ was another amusement. Sometimes they chose sides, say
four against four; and the party who had the most thrown had to
furnish their opponents with a cooked pig, served up with taro, or
supply any other kind of food that might be staked at the outset of