[Note: this transcription was produced by an automatic OCR engine]

4&0 MALEKULA
to buy back his former status. If inadvertently a man comes
into contact with something which is not so potently igah as this
he can, it seems, counteract the evil effects by the payment of
a pig. For instance, a certain coco~nut tree is made igah by the
fact that during their ceremonies the women climb it to obtain
the young nuts. It a man were to eat the fruit of such a tree
before it has been desacralized he would be mildly infected with
this female kind of sacredness. He takes no immediate steps
about the matter, but on the next occasion when he celebrates
a Nimangki he will imbamba bz/mm, that is, he will give a special
pig to the man who eats the sacriï¬Åcial pig (that " killed for the
Nimangki ") at the close of these rites. Thus he wipes out his
temporary condition of igah and becomes ilea once more.
On other occasions it seems that it is the women who must
pay a pig to the man to restore him to his non-nal condition.
This also is termed imbamba. The following may be cited as an
example of this. If any men wish to see part of the ceremonies
of the Lupus, they gather at a little distance from the clearing
where these are being held, at a spot specially allotted to them.
They remove everything that they are wearing (except the
nambas which “decencyâ€ù demands that they shall retain) for
fear lest their garments and ornaments should become polluted
with igah. They now will not or cannot leave this place until
the women have walked around them once, leading a small pig
which is then tied up to a tree. When this is done the condition
of igah is nulliï¬Åed and the men can leave without fear oi carrying
the pollution with them. Often they will tell the women to
hurry on with this circumambulatory rite in order that they
may go away.
There are, it seems, ï¬Åve distinct grades in the Lajbas society,
but before a girl is eligible to enter the lowest of these she must
pass through the ceremony of nix/oj>vowi:n.1 This she generally
does sometime during her adolescence, though some women may
postpone it until after their betrothal. It must, however, be
done before marriage. The central point of the ceremony is
the knocking out of the two upper incisor teeth. Socially it
appears to serve the same purpose as the incision of boys, for it
is a prerequisite to the wearing of the mat skirt niismbet and the
1 Other spellings given for Lhii word are niuovoiln and nivopwoin.
Nivopuou/im, however, is um most favoured by Deacon.-—C. x-1. w.
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