pair called ‘Sopimanuwata,’ which means, ‘water of Manuwata’ was found in olden days by a man of that island close to its shores. Another famous pair, made in Kayleula, was called ‘Bulivada,’ after a fish of this name. The larger shell of this pair was found, according to tradition, broken, with a hole near its apex. When they brought it to the surface they found a small bulivada fish which had taken up its abode in the shell. Another pair was called ‘Gomane ikola,’ which means ‘it is entangled in a net,’ as, according to the story, it was brought up in a net. There are many other celebrated mwali, the names of which are so familiar that boys and girls are named after them. But the majority of the names cannot be traced as to their origins.
Another point at which the armshells enter into the ring is Woodlark Island. I do not know for certain, but I believe that the industry is quite or almost extinct now in that island. In the olden days, Murua probably was quite as productive a centre of this manufacture as the Trobriands, and in these latter though Kayleula and the Western islands fish and work the mwali as much as ever, the natives of Kavataria are almost entirely out of it, busy all the time diving for pearls. Both the main places of origin of the armshells, therefore, are within the Kula ring. After they are made, or, as we saw in Kayleula, in the process of making, they enter the circulation. Their entry into the ring is not accompanied by any special rite or custom, and indeed it does not differ from an ordinary act of exchange. If the man who found the shell and made the mwali were not in the Kula himself, as might happen in Kavataria or Kayleula, he would have a relative, a brother-in-law, or a head man to whom he would give it in the form of one or other of the many gifts and payments obligatory in this society.
V
Let us follow the ring of the Kula, noticing its commercial side tracks, of which so far we only described the trading routes of Kavataria and Kayleula. To the Eastward, the section from Kitava to Woodlark Island is the one big portion of the Kula from which no lateral offshoots issue, and on which all the trade follows the same routes as the Kula. The other branch, of which I have got a good knowledge, that from the Trobriands to Dobu, has the commercial relations of which I have just spoken. The Amphletts, as described in Chapter XI trade with the natives of Fergusson Island. The Dobuan-speaking natives from Tewara, Sanaroa, and the Dawson Straits make exchange, though perhaps not on a very big scale, with the inland natives of Fergusson. The Dobuan-speaking communities on Normanby Island, and the natives of Du’a’u, on the Northern coast of Normanby, all of whom are in the Kula, trade with the other natives of Normanby Island who are not in the ring, and with the natives of the mainland of New Guinea from East Cape Westwards.