e cameras snap, the
crowd surges forward, the bystanders fling in great bundles of green
leaves. But the bundles strike the last man of the procession and cut
him off from his fellows; so he stays where he is, trampling down the
leaves as they are thrown to line the pit, in a dense cloud of steam from
the boiling sap. The rest leap back to his assistance, shouting and
trampling, and the pit turns into the mouth of an Inferno, filled with
dusky frenzied fiends, half seen through the dense volume that rolls up
to heaven and darkens the sunlight. After the leaves, palm-leaf baskets
of the dracaena root are flung to them, more leaves, and then bystanders
and every one join in shovelling earth over all till the pit is gone, and
a smoking mound of fresh earth takes its place. This will keep hot for
four days, and then the masawe will be cooked.

'As the procession had filed up to the pit, by a preconcerted arrangement
with the noble Jonathan, a large stone had been hooked out of the pit to
the feet of one of the party, who poised a pocket-handkerchief over it,
and dropped it lightly upon the stone when the first man leapt into the
oven, and snatched what remained of it up as the last left the stones.
During the fifteen or twenty seconds it lay there every fold that touched
the stone was charred, and the rest of it scorched yellow. So the stones
were not cool. We caught four or five of the performers as they came
out, and closely examined their feet. They were cool, and showed no
trace of scorching, nor were their anklets of dried tree-fern leaf burnt.
This, Jonathan explained, is part of the miracle; for dried tree-fern is
as combustible as tinder, and there were flames shooting out among the
stones. Sceptics had affirmed that the skin of a Fijian's foot being a
quarter of an inch thick, he would not feel a burn. Whether this be true
or not of the ball and heel, the instep is covered with skin no thicker
than our own, and we saw the men plant their insteps fairly on the
stone.'

* * * * *

Mr. Thomson's friend, Jonathan, said that young men had been selected
because they would look better in a photograph, and, being inexperienced,
they were afraid. A stranger would share the gift if he went in with one
of the tribe. Some years ago a man fell and burned his shoulders. 'Any
trick?' 'Here Jonathan's ample face shrunk smaller, and a shadow passed
over his candid eye.' Mr. Thomson concludes: 'Perhaps the Na Ivilank