with withering sarcasm, whether they imagine
that the tide will never flow again? It does so only too soon for the
poor ghosts, driving them with every breaking wave nearer and nearer to
their implacable enemy, till the water laps on the fatal stone, and then
he grips the shivering souls and dashes them to pieces on the big black
block.[778]

[Sidenote: The Killer of Souls.]

Again, there is a very terrible giant armed with a great axe, who lies
in wait for all and sundry. He makes no nice distinction between the
married and the unmarried, but strikes out at all ghosts
indiscriminately. Those whom he wounds dare not present themselves in
their damaged state to the great God Ndengei; so they never reach the
happy fields, but are doomed to roam the rugged mountains disconsolate.
However, many ghosts contrive to slip past him unscathed. It is said
that after the introduction of fire-arms into the islands the ghost of a
certain chief made very good use of a musket which had been
providentially buried with his body. When the giant drew near and was
about to lunge out with the axe in his usual style, the ghost discharged
the blunderbuss in his face, and while the giant was fully engaged in
dodging the hail of bullets, the chief rushed past him and now enjoys
celestial happiness.[779] Some lay the scene of this encounter a little
beyond the town of Nambanaggatai; for it is to be remembered that many
of the places in the Path of the Souls were identified with real places
in the Fijian Islands. And the name of the giant is Samu-yalo, that is,
the Killer of Souls. He artfully conceals himself in some mangrove
bushes just beyond the town, from which he rushes out in the nick of
time to fell the passing ghosts. Whenever he kills a ghost, he cooks and
eats him and that is the end of the poor ghost. It is the second death.
The highway to the Elysian fields runs, or used to run, right through
the town of Nambanaggatai; so all the doorways of the houses were placed
opposite each other to allow free and uninterrupted passage to the
invisible travellers. And the inhabitants spoke to each other in low
tones and communicated at a little distance by signs. The screech of a
paroquet in the woods was the signal of the approach of a ghost or
ghosts; the number of screeches was proportioned to the number of the
ghosts,--one screech, one ghost, and so on.[780]

[Sidenote: A trap for unwary ghosts.]

Souls who escape the Killer of Souls pass