w long thin dancing ribbons can be
seen hanging from their belts. The elaborate carved (turtle?) shell
ornament hanging over the breast of the man to the left is certainly
not of Mafulu make, and has probably come from the coast. I never
saw anything like it when I was at Mafulu. The two boys in front are
holding the ornament of elaborately prepared strings of feathers hung
upon a stick, and worn by dancers on their backs, and into which the
best feathers are generally put.

CHAPTER IX

Some other Ceremonies and Feasts

Ceremony on Birth.

There is no ceremony on the birth of a child, except in the case of the
first-born of a chief. On this occasion the women of a neighbouring
community are invited. They come in their full dancing ornaments,
and armed in both hands with spears and either clubs or adzes. They
rush into the village, first to the chiefs house and then to his
_emone_; and at each of these they make a warlike demonstration,
actually hurling their spears at the buildings with such force that
the spears sometimes go through the thatch of the roof. Then follows a
distribution of vegetables among the visitors, after which one, two,
or three village pigs are killed under a chiefs burial platform or
on the site of a past one, cut up in the ordinary way, as at the big
feast, given to the visitors and taken away by them, and the ceremony
is over. There is no singing. [72]

Ceremony on Assumption of Perineal Band.

This ceremony is performed for both boys and girls, and usually for
several at one time.

The children are heavily adorned with ornaments, consisting, as
a rule, chiefly of dogs' teeth, which are hung round their necks,
or over their foreheads; and they usually have belts of dogs' teeth
round their waists. Any persons may decorate the children.

Prior to the ceremony a number of box-like receptacles are erected in
the village by the children's relatives, there being one receptacle
for each child for whom the ceremony is to be performed. These
receptacles are made with upright corner poles 8 or 10 feet high,
boxed in with cross-pieces of wood up to a height of 5 or 6 feet. In
these receptacles are put yams and taro, upon their upright poles are
hung bananas and upon their cross-pieces of wood are hung lengths of
sugar-cane; all this being done by the families of the children.

Guests are invited from some other community or communities. There is
a dance, in which only people fr