I
In this chapter an account will be given of the ideas and beliefs associated with shipwreck, and of the various precautions which the natives take to insure their own safety. We shall find here a strange mixture of definite, matter of fact information, and of fantastic superstitions. Taking a critical, ethnographic side view, it may be said directly that the fanciful elements are intertwined with the realities in such a manner, that it is difficult to make a distinction between what is mere mytho-poetic fiction and what is a customary rule of behaviour, drawn from actual experience. The best way of presenting this material will be to give a consecutive account of a shipwreck, as it is told in Kiriwinian villages by the travelled old men to the younger generation. I shall adduce in it the several magical formulæ, the rules of behaviour, the part played by the miraculous fish, and the complex ritual of the saved party as they flee from the pursuing mulukwausi.
These—the flying witches—will play such an important part in the account, that I must begin with a detailed description of the various beliefs referring to them, though the subject has been touched upon once or twice before (Chapter II, Division VII, and other places). The sea and sailing upon it are intimately associated in the mind of a Boyowan with these women. They had to be mentioned in the description of canoe magic, and we shall see what an important part they play in the legends of canoe building. In his sailing, whether he goes to Kitava or further East, or whether he travels South to the Amphletts and Dobu, they form one of the main preoccupations of a Boyowan sailor. For they are not only dangerous to him, but to a certain extent, foreign. Boyowa, with the exception of Wawela and one or two other villages on the Eastern coast, and in the South of the island, is an ethnographic district, where the flying witches do not exist, although they visit it from time to time. Whereas all the surrounding tribes are full of women who practice this form of sorcery. Thus sailing South, the Boyowan is travelling straight into the heart of their domain.
These women have the power of making themselves invisible, and flying at night through the air. The orthodox belief is that a woman who is a yoyova can send forth a double which is invisible at will, but may appear in the form of a flying fox or of a night bird or a firefly. There is also a belief that a yoyova develops within her a something, shaped like an egg, or like a young, unripe coco-nut. This something is called as a matter of fact kapuwana, which is the word for a small coco-nut.1 This idea remains in the native’s mind in a vague, indefinite, undifferentiated form, and any attempt to elicit a more detailed definition by asking him such questions, as to whether the kapuwana is a material object or not, would be to smuggle our own categories into his belief, where they do not exist. The kapuwana is anyhow believed to be the something which in the nightly flights leaves the body of the yoyova and assumes the various forms in which the mulukwausi appears. Another variant of the belief about the yoyova is, that those who know their magic especially well, can fly themselves, bodily transporting themselves through the air.
But it can never be sufficiently emphasised that all these beliefs cannot be treated as consistent pieces of knowledge; they flow into one another, and even the same native probably holds several views rationally inconsistent with one another. Even their terminology (compare the last Division of the foregoing chapter), cannot be taken as implying a strict distinction or definition. Thus, the word yoyova is applied to the woman