IV

Let us now move North, towards the district marked “IV, the Dobu,” in our map, which forms one of the most important links in the chain of Kula and a very influential centre of cultural influence. As we sail North, passing East Cape, the Easternmost point of the main island—a long, flat promontory covered with palms and fruit belts, and harbouring a very dense population—a new world, new both geographically and ethnographically, opens up before us. At first it is only a faint, bluish silhouette, like a shadow of a distant mountain range, hovering far north over the horizon. As we approach, the hills of Normanby, the nearest of three big islands of the d’Entrecasteaux Archipelago, become clearer and take more definite shape and substance. A few high summits stand out more distinctly through the usual tropical haze, among them the characteristic double-peaked top of Bwebweso, the mountain where, according to native legend, the spirits of the dead in these parts lead their latter existence. The South Coast of Normanby, and the interior are inhabited by a tribe or tribes of which we know nothing ethnographically, except that they differ culturally from the rest of their neighbours. These tribes also take no direct part in the Kula.

The Northern end of Normanby, both sides of the Dawson Straits which separate the two islands of Normanby and Fergusson, and the South-eastern tip of Fergusson, are inhabited by a very important tribe, the Dobu. The heart of their district is the small extinct volcano forming an island at the Eastern entrance to Dawson Straits—Dobu, after which island they are named. To reach it, we have to sail through this extremely picturesque channel. On either side of the winding, narrow strait, green hills descend, and close it in, till it is more like a mountain lake. Here and there they recede, and a lagoon opens out. Or again they rise in fairly steep slopes, on which there can be plainly seen triangular gardens, native houses on piles, large tracts of unbroken jungle and patches of grass land. As we proceed, the narrow straits broaden, and we see on our right a wide flank of Mt. Sulomona’i on Normanby Island. On our left, there is a shallow bay, and behind it a large, flat plain, stretching far into the interior of Fergusson Island, and over it, we look into wide valleys, and on to several distant mountain ranges. After another turn, we enter a big bay, on both sides bordered by a flat foreshore, and in the middle of it rises out of a girdle of tropical vegetation, the creased cone of an extinct volcano, the island of Dobu.

We are now in the centre of a densely populated and ethnographically important district. From this island, in olden days, fierce and daring cannibal and head-hunting expeditions were periodically launched, to the dread of the neighbouring tribes. The natives of the immediately surrounding districts, of the flat foreshore on both sides of the straits, and of the big neighbouring islands were allies. But the more distant districts, often over a hundred miles away by sail, never felt safe from the Dobuans. Again, this was, and still is, one of the main links in the Kula, a centre of trade, industries and general cultural influence. It is characteristic of the international position of the Dobuans that their language is spoken as a lingua franca all over the d’Entrecasteaux Archipelago, in the Amphletts, and as far north as the Trobriands. In the southern part of these latter islands, almost everyone speaks Dobuan, although in Dobu the language of the Trobriands or Kiriwinian is hardly spoken by anyone. This is a remarkable fact, which cannot be easily explained in terms of the present conditions, as the Trobrianders, if anything, are on a higher level of cultural development than Dobuans, are more numerous, and enjoy the same general prestige.9

Another remarkable fact about Dobu and its district is that it is studded with spots of special, mythological interest. Its charming scenery, of volcanic cones, of wide, calm bays, and lagoons overhung by lofty, green mountains, with the reef-riddled, island-strewn ocean on the North, has deep, legendary meaning for the native. Here is the land and sea where the magically inspired sailors and heroes of the dim past performed feats of daring and power. As we sail from the entrance into Dawson Straits, through Dobu and the Amphletts to Boyowa, almost every new configuration of the land which we pass is the scene of some legendary exploit. Here the narrow gorge has been broken through by a magic canoe flying in the air. There the two rocks standing in the sea are the petrified bodies of two mythological heroes who were stranded at this spot after a quarrel. Here again, a land-locked lagoon has been a port of refuge to a mythical crew. Apart from its legends, the scenery before us, fine as it is, derives still more charm from the knowledge that it is, and has been a distant Eldorado, a land of promise and hope to generation after generation of really daring native sailors from the Northern islands. And in the past these lands and seas must have been the scene of migrations and fights, of tribal invasions, and of gradual infiltrations of peoples and cultures.

In personal appearance, the Dobuans have a very distinct physique, which differentiates them sharply from the Southern Massim and from the Trobrianders; very dark-skinned, small of stature, with big heads and rounded shoulders, they give a strange, almost gnome-like impression on a first encounter. In their manner, and their tribal character, there is something definitely pleasant, honest and open—an impression which long acquaintance with them confirms and strengthens. They are the general favourites of the whites, form the best and most reliable servants, and traders who have resided long among them compare them favourably with other natives.

Their villages, like those of the previously described Massim, are scattered over wide areas. The fertile and flat foreshores which they inhabit are studded with small, compact hamlets of a dozen or so houses, hidden in the midst of one continuous plantation of fruit trees, palms, bananas and yams. The houses are built on piles, but are cruder architecturally than those of the S. Massim, and almost without any decorations, though in the olden days of head-hunting some of them were ornamented with skulls.

In their social constitution, the people are totemic, being divided into a number of exogamous clans with linked totems. There is no institution of regular chieftainship, nor have they any system of rank or caste such as we shall meet in the Trobriands. Authority is vested in the elders of the tribe. In each hamlet there is a man who wields the greatest influence locally, and acts as its representative on such tribal councils as may arise in connection with ceremonies and expeditions.

Their system of kinship is matrilineal, and women hold a very good position, and wield great influence. They also seem to take a much more permanent and prominent part in tribal life than is the case among the neighbouring populations. There is notably one of the features of Dobuan society, which seems to strike the Trobrianders as peculiar, and to which they will direct attention while giving information, even although in the Trobriands also women have a good enough social position. In Dobu, women take an important part in gardening, and have a share in performing garden magic, and this in itself gives them a high status. Again, the main instrument for wielding power and inflicting penalties in these lands, sorcery, is to a great extent in the hands of women. The flying witches, so characteristic of the Eastern New Guinea type of culture, here have one of their strongholds. We shall have to go into this subject more in detail when speaking about shipwreck and the dangers of sailing. Besides this, women practice ordinary sorcery, which in other tribes is only man’s prerogative.

As a rule, amongst natives, a high position of women is associated with sex laxity. In this, Dobu is an exception. Not only are married women expected to remain faithful, and adultery considered a great crime, but, in sharp contrast to all surrounding tribes, the unmarried girls of Dobu remain strictly chaste. There are no ceremonial or customary forms of licence, and an intrigue would be certainly regarded as an offence.

A few more words must be said here about sorcery, as this is a matter of great importance in all inter-tribal relations. The dread of sorcery is enormous, and when the natives visit distant parts, this dread is enhanced by the additional awe of the unknown and foreign. Besides the flying witches, there are, in Dobu, men and women who, by their knowledge of magical spells and rites, can inflict disease and cause death. The methods of these sorcerers, and all the beliefs clustering round this subject are very much the same as those in the Trobriands which we shall meet later on. These methods are characterised by being very rational and direct, and implying hardly any supernatural element. The sorcerer has to utter a spell over some substance, and this must be administered by mouth, or else burnt over the fire in the victim’s hut. The pointing stick is also used by the sorcerers in certain rites.

If his methods are compared with those used by flying witches, who eat the heart and lungs, drink the blood, snap the bones of their enemies, and moreover possess the powers of invisibility and of flying, the Dobuan sorcerer seems to have but simple and clumsy means at his disposal. He is also very much behind his Mailu or Motu namesakes—I say namesakes, because sorcerers throughout the Massim are called Bara’u, and the same word is used in Mailu, while the Motu use the reduplicated Babara’u. The magicians in these parts use such powerful methods as those of killing the victim first, opening up the body, removing, lacerating or charming the inside, then bringing the victim to life again, only that he may soon sicken and eventually die.10

According to Dobuan belief, the spirits of the dead go to the top of Mt. Bwebweso on Normanby Island. This confined space harbours the shades of practically all the natives of the d’Entrecasteaux Archipelago, except those of Northern Goodenough Island, who, as I was told by some local informants, go after death to the spirit land of the Trobrianders.11 The Dobuans have also the belief in a double soul—one, shadowy and impersonal, surviving the bodily death for a few days only, and remaining in the vicinity of the grave, the other the real spirit, who goes to Bwebweso.

It is interesting to note how natives, living on the boundary between two cultures and between two types of belief, regard the ensuing differences. A native of, say, Southern Boyowa, confronted with the question:—how it is that the Dobuans place spirit-land on Bwebweso, whereas they, the Trobrianders, place it in Tuma?—does not see any difficulty in solving the problem. He does not regard the difference as due to a dogmatic conflict in doctrine. Quite simply he answers:—“Their dead go to Bwebweso and ours to Tuma.” The metaphysical laws of existence are not yet considered subject to one invariable truth. As human destinies in life change, according to varieties in tribal custom, so also the doings of the spirit! An interesting theory is evolved to harmonise the two beliefs in a mixed case. There is a belief that if a Trobriander were to die in Dobu, when on a Kula expedition, he would go for a time to Bwebweso. In due season, the spirits of the Trobrianders would sail from Tuma, the spirit land, to Bwebweso, on a spirit Kula, and the newly departed one would join their party and sail with them back to Tuma.

On leaving Dobu, we sail the open sea, a sea studded with coral patches and sand-banks, and seamed with long barrier reefs, where treacherous tides, running sometimes as much as five knots, make sailing really dangerous, especially for helpless native craft. This is the Kula sea, the scene of the inter-tribal expeditions and adventures which will be the theme of our future descriptions.

The Eastern shore of Ferguson Island, near Dobu, along which we are sailing, consists first of a series of volcanic cones and capes, giving the landscape the aspect of something unfinished and crudely put together. At the foot of the hills there stretches for several miles beyond Dobu a broad alluvial flat covered with villages—Deide’i, Tu’utauna, Bwayowa, all important centres of trade, and the homes of the direct Kula partners of the Trobrianders. Heavy fumes can be seen floating above the jungle, coming from the hot geysers of Deide’i, which spurt up in high jets every few minutes.

Soon we come abreast of two characteristically shaped, dark rocks, one half hidden in the vegetation of the shore, the other standing in the sea at the end of a narrow sand-spit dividing the two. These are Atu’a’ine and Aturamo’a, two men turned into stone, as mythical tradition has it. Here the big sailing expeditions, those starting northwards from Dobu, as well as those arriving from the North, still make a halt—just as they have done for centuries, and, under observation of many taboos, give sacrificial offerings to the stones, with ritual invocations for propitious trade.

In the lee of these two rocks, runs a small bay with a clean, sandy beach, called Sarubwoyna. Here a visitor, lucky enough to pass at the right moment of the right season would see a picturesque and interesting scene. There before him would lie a huge fleet of some fifty to a hundred canoes, anchored in the shallow water, with swarms of natives upon them, all engaged in some strange and mysterious task. Some of these, bent over heaps of herbs, would be mumbling incantations; others would be painting and adorning their bodies. An onlooker of two generations ago coming upon the same scene would no doubt have been led to suspect that he was watching the preparations for some dramatic tribal contest, for one of those big onslaughts in which the existence of whole villages and tribes were wiped out. It would even have been difficult for him to discern from the behaviour of the natives whether they were moved more by fear or by the spirit of aggression, as both these passions might have been read—and correctly so—into their attitudes and movements. That the scene contained no element of warfare; that this fleet had come here from about a hundred miles sailing distance on a well regulated tribal visit; that it had drawn up here for the final and most important preparations—this would not have been an easy guess to make. Nowadays—for this is carried out to this day with undiminished pomp—it would be an equally picturesque, but of course, tamer affair, since the romance of danger has gone from native life. As we learn in the course of this study to know more about these natives, their general ways and customs, and more especially about their Kula cycle of beliefs, ideas and sentiments, we shall be able to look with understanding eyes upon this scene, and comprehend this mixture of awe with intense, almost aggressive eagerness and this behaviour, which appears cowed and fierce at the same time.