Popular Science Monthly - Oct, Nov, Dec, 1915 — Volume 86 by Anonymous
page 32 of 485 (06%)
page 32 of 485 (06%)
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servants to the chiefs.
But the process of god-making did not end with the appearance of men, for great chiefs and warriors after death became kalou yalo, or spirits, and often remained upon earth a menace to the unwary who might offend them. Curiously, these deified mortals might suffer a second death which would result in their utter annihilation, and while in Fiji we heard a tale of an old chief who had met with the ghost of his dead enemy and had killed him for the second and last time; the club which served in this miraculous victory having been hung up in the Mbure as an object of veneration. Of a still lower order were the ghosts of common men or of animals, and most dreaded of all was the vengeful spirit of the man who had been devoured. The ghosts of savage Fiji appear all to have been malevolent and fearful beings, whereas those of the more cultured Polynesians were some of them benevolent. As Ellis says of the Tahitian mythology: Each lovely island was made a sort of fairyland and the spells of enchantment were thrown over its varied scenes. The sentiment of the poet that "Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth, Unseen, both when we wake, and when we sleep" was one familiar to their minds, and it is impossible not to feel interested in a people who were accustomed to consider themselves surrounded by invisible intelligences, anti who |
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