especially very clear and reliable. But it has not been checked by personal observation, and as is always the case with such material, there is no guarantee of its being complete.
From the point of view in which it interests us, however, that is, in connection with the Kula, the outstanding fact is well established; a mortuary taboo temporarily holds up the flow of Kula goods, and a big quantity of valuables thus dammed up, is suddenly let loose by the so’i and spreads in a big wave along the circuit.
The big wave of armshells, for instance, which travelled along and was taken up by the uvalaku expedition of the Dobuans, was the ripple of a so’i feast, held one or two months previously at full moon in Yanabwa, a village of Woodlark Island.
When I was leaving Boyowa, in September, 1918, a mortuary taboo was in force in the Island of Yeguma, or Egum, as it is pronounced in the Eastern district (the Alcester Islands of the map).
Kwaywaya, the chief of Kitava whom I met on his visit in Sinaketa, told me that the people of Yeguma had sent him a sprouting coco-nut, with the message: “When its leaves develop, we shall sagali (make the distribution).”
They had kept a coco-nut at the same stage of development in their village, and sent others to to all the neighbouring communities.
This would give a first approach in fixing the date, which would be appointed more precisely when the feast was close at hand.