ultery
savagely punished by clubbing or strangling; but, as I made clear in
the chapter on jealousy, such vindictive punishment does not indicate
a regard for chastity, but is merely revenge for infringement on
property rights. The national custom permitting a man whose conjugal
property had been molested to retaliate by subjecting the culprit's
wife to the same treatment in itself indicates an utter absence of the
notion of chastity as a virtue. Like the Papuan, Melanesian, and
Polynesian inhabitants of the Pacific Islands in general, the Fijians
were utterly licentious. Young women, says Williams (145) are the
victims of man's lust;

"all the evils of the most licentious sensuality are
found among this people. In the case of the chiefs,
these are fully carried out, and the vulgar follow as
far as their means will allow. But here, even at the
risk of making the picture incomplete, there may not be
given a faithful representation" (115).

When a band of warriors returns victorious, they are met by the women;
but "the words of the women's song may not be translated; nor are the
obscene gestures of their dance, in which the young virgins are
compelled to take part, or the foul insults offered to the corpses of
the slain, fit to be described.... On these occasions the ordinary
social restrictions are destroyed, and the unbridled and
indiscriminate indulgence of every evil lust and passion completes the
scene of abomination" (43). Yet,

"voluntary breach of the marriage contract is rare in
comparison with that which is enforced, as, for
instance, when the chief gives up the women of a town
to a company of visitors or warriors. Compliance with
this mandate is compulsory, but should the woman
conceal it from her husband, she would be severely
punished" (147).

EMOTIONAL CURIOSITIES

When Williams adds to the last sentence that "fear prevents
unfaithfulness more than affection, though I believe that instances of
the latter are numerous," we must not allow ourselves to be deceived
by a word. Fijian "affection" is a thing quite different from the
altruistic feeling we mean by the word. It may in a wife assume the
form of a blind attachment, like that of a dog to a cruel master, but
is not likely to go beyond that, since even the most primitive love
between parents and children is confessedly shallow, transient, or
entirely absent. Williams (154, 142) "no