Of course women and children might not come near the place, and, further, they did not know what the augŭds were like. They only knew of the crocodile (Kodal) as “Maiau” and of the hammer-headed shark (Kursi) as “Sigai.” These heroes were related to the equally legendary Malu of Murray Island, who also had a dual human-shark personality.
This discovery is another of the links found between totemism and hero-worship, which I have noted in Torres Straits. I am not aware whether this transition has been previously described as occurring among a living people, but it seems as if it may be possible to trace some stages at least between pure totemism on the one hand and hero-worship on the other, and a hero-worship that is suspiciously like the origin of a god. I have collected all the legends I could concerning the histories of the heroes Bornai, Malu, Sigai, Maiau, and Sau.
According to our usual custom we visited all the shrines we heard of in the island; of these not the least interesting was the small boys’ kwod, in which were two small heaps of ruddled shells, and where the boys played at augŭd. All over the world boys mimic the actions of their fathers, and we came across several instances of this during our Expedition. At Veifaa, in the Mekeo district of British New Guinea, some boys imitated, as we shall see, the masked taboo officials. Here they went a step further, and played at augŭd, the most sacred of all their religious ceremonies. In this case they cannot be said to have exactly mimicked their elders, as they did not know what the real augŭd was like, nor how the ceremonies were conducted, but they “made believe” to their own satisfaction.
Returning from the kwod, Maino pointed out a shelter under a rock where formerly two skulls had been kept. Unfortunately one was burnt when the ground was being cleared for a garden, but the other was in good condition, and Maino allowed me to appropriate it. He did not wish me to take the lower jaw of the burnt skull which was lying close by, and was anxious that no one should know he had given me the whole skull, nor would he touch it himself.
The afternoon was mainly devoted to photography and the phonograph.
NAGIR
We made an early start the next day, and in the forenoon visited Nagir (Mount Ernest). Here we found only two old men and one old woman. There were a few other inhabitants out in shelling boats, but the islanders are on the verge of extinction.
As we could only have two hours on the island, and there were places on it we wished to visit, there was but little time to prosecute inquiries; still we got something done.
The old kwod and other sacred spots are in a shocking state. Jimmy Samoa, an enormous Samoan, has resided on the island for many years, and he has made his garden in the kwod and built his house close by it. “Ichabod” was writ large. There was nothing to see, and very little reliable information to be had. It was a poor set-off, so far as we were concerned, to find Jimmy Samoa in possession of a graphophone!