to the widow to drink,
who is forced to gulp them down under the threat of decapitation if she
were to reject the loathsome beverage.[500]

[Sidenote: Restrictions observed by mourners. Tattooing in honour of the
dead. Teeth of the dead worn by relatives.]

The family in which a death has taken place is subject for a time to
certain burdensome restrictions, which are probably dictated by a fear
of the ghost. Thus all the time till the effigy of the deceased has been
made and a feast given in his honour, they are obliged to remain in the
house without going out for any purpose, not even to bathe or to fetch
food and drink. Moreover they must abstain from the ordinary articles of
diet and confine themselves to half-baked cakes of sago and other
unpalatable viands. As these restrictions may last for months they are
not only irksome but onerous, especially to people who have no slaves to
fetch and carry for them. However, in that case the neighbours come to
the rescue and supply the mourners with wood, water, and the other
necessaries of life, until custom allows them to go out and help
themselves. After the effigy of the dead has been made, the family go in
state to a sacred place to purify themselves by bathing. If the journey
is made by sea, no other canoe may meet or sail past the canoe of the
mourners under pain of being confiscated to them and redeemed at a heavy
price. On their return from the holy place, the period of mourning is
over, and the family is free to resume their ordinary mode of life and
their ordinary victuals.[501] That the seclusion of the mourners in the
house for some time after the death springs from a fear of the ghost is
not only probable on general grounds but is directly suggested by a
custom which is observed at the burial of the body. When it has been
laid in the earth along with various articles of daily use, which the
ghost is supposed to require for his comfort, the mourners gather round
the grave and each of them picks up a leaf, which he folds in the shape
of a spoon and holds several times over his head as if he would pour out
the contents upon it. As they do so, they all murmur, "_Rur i rama_,"
that is, "The spirit comes." This exclamation or incantation is supposed
to prevent the ghost from troubling them. The gravediggers may not enter
their houses till they have bathed and so removed from their persons the
contagion of death, in order that the soul of the deceased may have no
powe