ly bolted
with the corpse to the grave, and before he could collect his scattered
wits grandfather was safely landed in his long home.[673]

[Sidenote: Special relation of grandfather to grandchild. Soul of a
grandfather reborn in his grandchildren.]

Mr. Fison, who reports this quaint mode of bilking a ghost, explains the
special attachment of the grandfather to his grandchild by the rule of
female descent which survives in Vanua-levu; and it is true that where
exogamy prevails along with female descent, a child regularly belongs to
the exogamous class of its grandfather and not of its father and hence
may be regarded as more closely akin to the grandfather than to the
father. But on the other hand it is to be observed that exogamy at
present is unknown in Fiji, and at most its former prevalence in the
islands can only be indirectly inferred from relics of totemism and from
the existence of the classificatory system of relationship.[674] Perhaps
the real reason why in Vanua-levu a dead grandfather is so anxious to
carry off the soul of his living grandchild lies nearer to hand in the
apparently widespread belief that the soul of the grandfather is
actually reborn in his grandchild. For example, in Nukahiva, one of the
Marquesas Islands, every one "is persuaded that the soul of a
grandfather is transmitted by nature into the body of his grandchildren;
and that, if an unfruitful wife were to place herself under the corpse
of her deceased grandfather, she would be sure to become pregnant."[675]
Again, the Kayans of Borneo "believe in the reincarnation of the soul,
although this belief is not clearly harmonised with the belief in the
life in another world. It is generally believed that the soul of a
grandfather may pass into one of his grandchildren, and an old man will
try to secure the passage of his soul to a favourite grandchild by
holding it above his head from time to time. The grandfather usually
gives up his name to his eldest grandson, and reassumes the original
name of his childhood with the prefix or title _Laki_, and the custom
seems to be connected with this belief or hope."[676]

[Sidenote: A dead grandfather may reasonably reclaim his own soul from
his grandchild.]

Now where such a belief is held, it seems reasonable enough that a dead
grandfather should reclaim his own soul for his personal use before he
sets out for the spirit land; else how could he expect to be admitted to
that blissful abode if on