CHAPTER XII
A curious religion—Burying the dead, and some graveyards—Dancers and music—Native artists, and how fire is made.
To try and discover the actual religious beliefs of a savage race is even more difficult than attempting the same experiment on the religion of any particular European sect. It is almost impossible to find two people agreeing consistently on even the main principles. Exactly the same trouble exists in savage races; if you are lucky enough to discover a principle you will immediately get a dozen different interpretations of it, and only where a sect follows implicitly the ruling of one leader, and does not question or argue against his teachings, can you gain any knowledge worth the trouble and time you may expend on it; but in these cases I have found that neither reason nor understanding play any part in the belief, and it therefore lacks interest. But, strange to say, throughout the savage and civilised races there seems to be a belief in a {125} heaven and a hell. These two ideas, though varying in detail, are world wide, but notions of the way to get there, however, differ considerably.
The Solomon islanders nearly all believe that when a man or woman dies he goes to live with a good spirit (nito drekona) in a far off but pleasant land, where his companions will be as good as he is, or nearly so. The bad man, so judged by his companions, goes to a place of fire, the abode of the Evil One (nito paitena), where he has anything but a happy time. During his existence there he does his best to make things unpleasant for the friends he has left behind him, by becoming one of the many evil spirits who are supposed to do harm to the living.
To obtain any further information on this subject is extremely difficult, and, as in other races, each man and woman has a different idea of the future state, some of which are particularly quaint. The Solomon islander’s idea of a heavenly condition would be anything but heavenly to us, in fact some of our worst ideas of the other place would pale before their crude notions of heaven.
Another fancy they all seem to hold is that the spirits of the departed return to earth, some as fireflies, and some as birds, etc. They all {126} believe that the Supreme Spirit is the embodiment of good, and yet in the same breath they will tell you that He becomes angry and needs that His anger should be appeased either by incantations or the sacrifice of human beings.
On the death of a chief, a great personage, male or female, universal mourning is adopted, accompanied by feasting, which they believe helps the spirit on its journey to the better land—for all great people and chiefs go there direct, a fact about which they seem to deplore, as they will talk of the departed one as the “poor chief.” The names of the dead are held in great reverence, and in some islands they are never mentioned except under the breath, or in the greatest secrecy.
Funeral rites differ a good deal on the various islands, but the most common ones constitute a feast which is celebrated when a powerful personage dies. Directly the news of his death is announced the natives of his tribe set about procuring a supply of food, and calling together all the natives, and then they commence the feast, which is followed by a dance and the last rites peculiar to these islands.