the two persons concerned, who must surely know best how they feel
towards one another. But I remember having met lots of taboos among
other barbarians, in much the same way, to preserve the mere
material purity of their women--a thing we at home wouldn't dream
of even questioning. In New Ireland, for instance, I saw poor girls
confined for four or five years in small wickerwork cages, where
they're kept in the dark, and not even allowed to set foot on the
ground on any pretext. They're shut up in these prisons when
they're about fourteen, and there they're kept, strictly tabooed,
till they're just going to be married. I went to see them myself;
it was a horrid sight. The poor creatures were confined in a dark,
close hut, without air or ventilation, in that stifling climate,
which is as unendurable from heat as this one is from cold and damp
and fogginess; and there they sat in cages, coarsely woven from
broad leaves of the pandanus trees, so that no light could enter;
for the people believed that light would kill them. No man might
see them, because it was close taboo; but at last, with great
difficulty, I persuaded the chief and the old lady who guarded them
to let them come out for a minute to look at me. A lot of beads and
cloth overcame these people's scruples; and with great reluctance
they opened the cages. But only the old woman looked; the chief was
afraid, and turned his head the other way, mumbling charms to his
fetich. Out they stole, one by one, poor souls, ashamed and
frightened, hiding their faces in their hands, thinking I was going
to hurt them or eat them--just as your nieces would do if I
proposed to-day to take them to Exeter--and a dreadful sight they
were, cramped with long sitting in one close position, and their
eyes all blinded by the glare of the sunlight after the long
darkness. I've seen women shut up in pretty much the same way in
other countries, but I never saw quite so bad a case as this of New