To a high chief, ua susu mai.
To the sovereign, ua afio mai.
In Tonga there are traces of a second order of ceremonial synonyms; i.e. over and above those ordinarily in use, there is a series for the particular divine chief Tiutonga.[85]
| CEREMONIAL. | TIUTONGA. | COMMON. | ENGLISH. |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fofonga | langi | mata | face. |
| Ilo | taumafa | kai | eat. |
| Mamata | taka | tio | see. |
| Ofai | hala | mate | dead. |
| Tengitangi | buluhi | mahaki | sick. |
| Toka | tofa | moe | sleep. |
In Tahitian, an excessively figurative manner of speech is said to supersede the proper system of ceremonial synonyms, the houses of the chief being the clouds of heaven; his canoe, the rainbow; his voice, the thunder, and so on.
The names too of the chiefs are almost always significant, and almost always compound, and, in some cases, they run to a very considerable length, as Tai-ma-le-langi=sea and sky; Tau-i-te-ao-bu=suspended in the blue heavens; Ta-lana-tupu-a-pai-ta-lani-nui=the sky increasing and striking the great heaven. Now the owners of any such names as these are supposed to be complimented by the Tahitians ceasing to employ, in the language of their daily intercourse, one, or more, of the words which formed parts of them; so that, in the case of Tai-ma-le-langi, the syllables tai, mai, le, or langi, are lost to the common language, until the death of the chief, so designated. After his decease, however, they return to the language. In this way, between the voyages of Cook and Vancouver, no less than forty or fifty words had been superseded by new ones: indeed, of the first ten numerals, four are now different from what they were in Cook's time.
| Original form. | Present form. | |
|---|---|---|
| 2. | Rua | piti. |
| 4. | Ha | maha. |
| 5. | Rima | pae. |
| 6. | Ono | fene. |
Note 1.—Since the notice of the Fiji Islands was written a youth of that group—i.e. from the island of Lafu—has been brought over to England by Mr. James Boyd, been presented at the Ethnological Society, and is now in London. The most remarkable point is a reddish tinge, clearly perceptible under a cross light, in his otherwise black and frizzy hair. If I am right in referring this shade to the use of alkaline washes used in youth for the purposes of whitening the hair, it shows the unsafeness of talking about naturally red hair for any of Oceanic islands; since, in the case in question, it was upwards of five years since any alkaline wash had been applied.
Note 2.—In p. 184. I have overstated the extent to which the notion that Polynesia Proper was peopled from Kelænonesia rather than from Micronesia was general. Although not found (as far as I know) in any of the systematic works on the subject of human migration, it is by no means singular. It is the opinion of Mr. Norriss, and—subject to an alternative—the recorded opinion of Mr. Jukes, who writes,—