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xix.]
The Little Orphan.
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deserted garden. But as they ran away the old woman sat down, the bags of money were very heavy upon her, and one of the bags fell down. And a pig with tusks remained tied at that landing-place at Sanwawa, and that money-bag remained lying where it fell. And that Little Orphan woke and jumped up, and there he was in a deserted garden, and he ran looking for those two, and he came out upon the shore, and sees an old woman sitting there and asks, Oh! have you seen anybody at all here just now? And she sings, Look, look over there! loio! ialo! the two are plunging back into the sea at the place where the Little Orphan had fished them up. It is finished.[1]
- ↑ Note.—Two more Stories from Mota in native MS. are too long for insertion in full. One is the Story of Wowut-ta-Taragaviga, whom his parents kept in the house till he was grown up, and then advanced to the highest suqe rank. Another man of the same island taking the same step sent a portion of his feast to Wowut-ta-Taragaviga by an orphan, all others being afraid of approaching the gamal of so high a rank. Wowut takes a liking to the orphan, and pays him with money. He goes again and again with food till he has 'thousands of money, thousands of boars, thousands of pigs with curled tusks,' and with these advances himself to high suqe rank. Then Wowut dies, and directs that when his friend comes to mourn over him he is to be given his wife in memory of him. The other is the Story of Qat-wuruga, who was born of a mother who had been killed by a fall from a tree, and grew up in the forest like the children in the Story of Taso. His maternal uncle finds him and takes him home, where his uncle's wives neglect him and ill-use him, and give him his name of Scurfy-head. The boy begs his uncle to take him back to the forest, and he carries him out of the sight of the sea into the midst of the island, Vanua Lava. Then he settles himself, and after a while snares birds. One day the fat of a bird roasting over the fire fell through on to the head of Wetopunpun beneath the earth, and he comes up above ground. This is the boy's father, the ghost of his dead father, or a Vui spirit. With the charm 'Soso-punpun, Soso-punpun' (like the Kerembaembae of Story No. 1) he makes food, gardens, a village, a gamal, pigs, fowls, a drum&mdsh;all native wealth. Qat-wuruga's uncle comes to see him, and undertakes his advance to the highest ranks of the suqe, receiving his due payment of pigs. His wives, incredulous at first, go to a kolekole and see the youth they have despised in all his splendour. They desire to stay as his wives, and make him cut open his breast and give them some of his liver to eat. A canoe from Maewo comes over, and they find the fresh emblems of his rank; they challenge comparison with their own, and see open-mouthed with astonishment the number of jawbones of the pigs he has killed in his feasts. They beguile him to sleep, and carry him off to their own island to kill and eat him. While they are
