outrigger side, so the sailing canoe is always tilted with its float raised, and the platform slanting towards the body of the canoe. This makes it necessary for it to be able to change bows and stern at will; for imagine that a canoe going due South, has to sail with a North-Easterly wind, then the lamina (outrigger) must be on the left hand, and the canoe sails with what the natives call its “head” forward. Now imagine that the wind turns to the North-West. Should this happen in a violent squall, without warning, the canoe would be at once submerged. But, as such a change would be gradual, barring accidents, the natives could easily cope with it. The mast, which is tied at the fourth cross-pole (ri’u) from the temporary bows of the canoe, would be unbound, the canoe would be turned 180 degrees around, so that its head would now form the stern, its u’ula (foundation) would face South, and become its bows, and the platform would be to our right, facing West. The mast would be attached again to the fourth cross-pole (ri’u), from the u’ula end, the sail hoisted, and the canoe would glide along with the wind striking it again on its outrigger side, but having changed bows to stern (see Plate XLI).
The natives have a set of nautical expressions to describe the various operations of changing mast, of trimming the sail, of paying out the sheet rope, of shifting the sail, so that it stands up with its bottom end high, and its tip touching the canoe, or else letting it lie with both boom and gaff almost horizontal. And they have definite rules as to how the various manœuvres should be carried out, according to the strength of the wind, and to the quarter on which it strikes the canoe. They have four expressions denoting a following wind, wind striking the outrigger beam, wind striking the canoe from the katala (built-out body), and wind striking the canoe on the outrigger side close to the direction of sailing. There is no point, however, in adducing this native terminology here, as we shall not any further refer to it; it is enough to know that they have got definite rules, and means of expressing them, with regard to the handling of a canoe.
It has been often remarked here, that the Trobriand canoes cannot sail