We Quickly
Discovered That We Dare Not Admire Their Possessions, For Whenever
We Did Admire A Particular Object It Was Immediately Presented To
Us.
The two vahines, according to the way of vahines, got together
in a discussion and examination of feminine fripperies, while Tehei
and I, manlike, went over fishing-tackle and wild-pig-hunting, to
say nothing of the device whereby bonitas are caught on forty-foot
poles from double canoes.
Charmian admired a sewing basket - the
best example she had seen of Polynesian basketry; it was hers. I
admired a bonita hook, carved in one piece from a pearl-shell; it
was mine. Charmian was attracted by a fancy braid of straw sennit,
thirty feet of it in a roll, sufficient to make a hat of any design
one wished; the roll of sennit was hers. My gaze lingered upon a
poi-pounder that dated back to the old stone days; it was mine.
Charmian dwelt a moment too long on a wooden poi-bowl, canoe-shaped,
with four legs, all carved in one piece of wood; it was hers. I
glanced a second time at a gigantic cocoanut calabash; it was mine.
Then Charmian and I held a conference in which we resolved to admire
no more - not because it did not pay well enough, but because it paid
too well. Also, we were already racking our brains over the
contents of the Snark for suitable return presents. Christmas is an
easy problem compared with a Polynesian giving-feast.
We sat on the cool porch, on Bihaura's best mats while dinner was
preparing, and at the same time met the villagers. In twos and
threes and groups they strayed along, shaking hands and uttering the
Tahitian word of greeting - Ioarana, pronounced yo-rah-nah. The men,
big strapping fellows, were in loin-cloths, with here and there no
shirt, while the women wore the universal ahu, a sort of adult
pinafore that flows in graceful lines from the shoulders to the
ground. Sad to see was the elephantiasis that afflicted some of
them. Here would be a comely woman of magnificent proportions, with
the port of a queen, yet marred by one arm four times - or a dozen
times - the size of the other. Beside her might stand a six-foot
man, erect, mighty-muscled, bronzed, with the body of a god, yet
with feet and calves so swollen that they ran together, forming
legs, shapeless, monstrous, that were for all the world like
elephant legs.
No one seems really to know the cause of the South Sea
elephantiasis. One theory is that it is caused by the drinking of
polluted water. Another theory attributes it to inoculation through
mosquito bites. A third theory charges it to predisposition plus
the process of acclimatization. On the other hand, no one that
stands in finicky dread of it and similar diseases can afford to
travel in the South Seas. There will be occasions when such a one
must drink water.
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