chiefs
also wear their cassowary feathers; and they all carry their drums
and spears, and sometimes clubs or adzes. After the dance has begun,
the chief of the clan in whose village the dance occurs distributes,
with assistance, among the more important of these dancers, especially
chiefs, the skulls and bones which had been put on one side after
the cutting down of the burial platform, and probably some or all
of the skulls and bones which had been hung upon the big posts;
and the dancers receiving these skulls and bones wear them as
additional decoration upon their arms throughout the dance. Guest
chiefs dance with the others, but owing to the heavy weight of the
head ornaments they have to carry, they will be tired sooner than
the others. The dancing party enter the village at the entrance end,
walking backwards. Directly after they have entered the village they,
still having their backs to it, begin to beat their drums, after doing
which for a short time they turn round, and the dancing begins. The
dancers beat their drums whilst dancing, but neither they nor the
other people sing during the actual dancing. There are, however,
intervals in the dancing (not the mere rest intervals, such as they
have in Mekeo, and which they also have in Mafulu, but intervals which
are themselves an actual part of the dance), and during these intervals
the drums are not being beaten, and the dancers and the other people,
hosts, guests, men and women, all sing. I shall have something more
to say about dancing generally later on. At a subsequent stage the
skulls and bones with which the dancers have been decorated, including
those which had fallen from the burial platform, are all again hung
up among the other skulls and bones on the big posts.

Tenth: This is the stage at which occur various other ceremonies,
which, though themselves quite distinct from that of the big feast, and
performed, often several of them together, when there is no big feast,
are also, some or all of them, generally or always introduced into it,
as being a convenient occasion for them. The ceremonies in question
are those connected with the assumption of the perineal band, admission
to the _emone_ and the giving of the right to carry a drum and dance,
that of nose-piercing, and that on the devolution of chieftainship. The
nose-piercing ceremony has already been described. The others will
be dealt with later.

Eleventh: Next comes the general distribution amon