for example, the actions of
sitting, talking, eating, sleeping, and dying were expressed by
different terms according as the agent was a chief or a common man. The
ordinary word for a house was _fale_; but a chief's house was called
_maota_. The common word for anger was _ita_; the polite term was
_toasa_. To sleep in ordinary language was _moe_, but in polite language
it was _tof[=a]_ or _toa_. To be sick in common speech was _mai_, but in
polite language it was _ngasengase, faatafa, pulu pulusi_. To die was
_mate_ or _pe_ (said of animals), or _oti_ (said of men); but the
courtly expressions for death were _maliu_ ("gone"), _folau_ ("gone on a
voyage"), _fale-lauasi, ngasololo ao_, and a number of others. The terms
substituted in the court language sometimes had a meaning the very
opposite of that borne by the corresponding terms in the ordinary
language. For example, in the court language firewood was called
_polata_, which properly means the stem of the banana plant, a wood that
is incombustible. If the use of an ordinary word in the presence of a
chief were unavoidable, it had to be prefaced by the apologetic phrase
_veaeane_, literally "saving your presence," every time the word was
spoken. Nay, the courtly language itself varied with the rank of the
chief addressed or alluded to. For example, if you wished to say that a
person had come, you would say _alu_ of a common man; _alala_ of a head
of a household or landowner (_tulafale_); _maliu_ of a petty chief;
_susu_ of a chief of the second class; and _afiu_ of a chief of the
highest rank.[50] The same respect which was shown in the use of words
descriptive of a chief's actions or possessions was naturally extended
to his own name, when he belonged to the class of sacred chiefs. If his
name happened to be also the name of a common object, it ceased to be
used to designate the thing in question, and a new word or phrase was
substituted for it. Henceforth the old name of the object was dropped
and might never again be pronounced in the chief's district nor indeed
anywhere in his presence. In one district, for example, the chief's name
was Flying-fox; hence the ordinary word for flying-fox (_re'a_) was
dropped, and that species of bat was known as "bird of heaven" (_manu
langi_).[51] Again, when the chief of Pango-pango, in the island of
Tutuila, was called Maunga, which means "mountain," that word might
never be used in his presence, and a courtly term was substituted