It will be noted, that this is the third meaning in which the term pokala is used by the natives. (Cf. Chapter VI, Division VI.)

See the Author’s Memoir, “The Natives of Mailu” in Transactions of the R. Society of S. Australia for 1915, p. 598.

These views have been elaborated in the previously quoted article on “Primitive Economics” in the Economic Journal, March, 1921.

The association of magic with any vital interest is demonstrated by the case of pearling. Here, through the advent of white men, a new and very lucrative and absorbing pursuit has opened up for the natives. A form of magic is now in existence, associated with this fishing. This of course apparently contradicts the native dogma that magic cannot be invented. The natives, if faced with this contradiction, explain that it is really an old magic of shell fishing which refers to all the shells found at the bottom of the Lagoon, but which so far had only been used with regard to fishing for the Conus. In fact, this magic is nothing but the adaptation of the mwali (armshell) magic to the pearls. I doubt, none the less, whether even such a transference or adaptation would have taken place before the foundations of native belief and custom had been shaken by the well-intentioned but not always wise and beneficent teachings and rulings of the white man and by the introduction of trade.

See article by the Author on the “Baloma, spirits of the dead in the Trobriand islands.” J. A. I., 1917.

An example of this ill-judged attitude of interference is to be found even in a book written by an exceptionally well-informed and enlightened missionary, “In Far New Guinea,” by Henry Newton. In describing the feasts and dancing of the natives, he admits these to be a necessity of tribal life: “On the whole the feasting and dancing are good; they give excitement and relaxation to the young men, and tone the drab colours of life.” He himself tells us that, “the time comes when the old men stop the dancing. They begin to growl because the gardens are neglected, and they want to know if dancing will give the people food, so the order is given that the drums are to be hung up, and the people settle down to work.” But in spite of Mr.