or plant, though, as will be seen hereafter,
it sometimes apparently _becomes_ a plant; and there is no difference
in their minds between the case of a person who has died naturally
and one who has been killed in battle or otherwise, or between persons
who have or have not been eaten, or who have or have not been buried,
though in case of burial there are the methods of getting rid of the
ghost; and there is no superstitious avoidance of graves or fear of
mentioning a deceased person by name, and no superstition as to the
shadows of living persons passing over graves and sacred places. Except
as above stated, I found no trace of any belief in a future state.

When on the death of a man or woman or child, the ghostly self leaves
the body, or at all events when the funeral pig-killing has been
performed, the ghost goes away to the tops of the mountains, where
apparently it exists as a ghost for ever. The shouting immediately
after the death, and afterwards at the funeral, are steps towards
driving it there; and the pig-killing ceremony completes the
process. On reaching the mountains the ghost _becomes_ one of two
things. The ghost of a young or grown-up person up to, say, forty or
forty-five years of age becomes the shimmering light upon the ground
and undergrowth, which occurs here and there where the dense forest of
the mountains is penetrated by the sun's beams. It is apparently only
the light which shimmers on the ground and undergrowth, and not that
in the air. The ghost of an elderly person over forty or forty-five
years of age becomes a large sort of fungus, which is indigenous to
the mountains, where alone it is found. Any native who on a hunting
expedition or otherwise meets with a glade in which this shimmering
light occurs will carefully pass round it, instead of going across
it; and any native finding one of these fungi will neither eat nor
touch, nor even tread upon it; though indeed, as regards the eating,
I understand that this particular fungus is one of the poisonous
non-edible forms. A native who, after the recent death of another,
is travelling in the mountains, and there finds a young fungus of
this species only just starting into growth, will think that it is
probably the ghost of the recently departed one.

As regards the use by me with reference to both sunbeams and fungi of
the word "_becomes_" I recognise that it may justify much doubt and
questioning. The idea of actually _becoming_ the flicker