Читать книгу Lolóma, or two years in cannibal-land. A story of old Fiji онлайн

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However all this may be, one thing seems certain, that these lands would be utterly unable to hold their own, but for the prodigious work of that silent little builder, who, upon the sunken débris of sunny plains that were, has piled up and cemented together those grand and unique breakwaters, in comparison with which the defensive and aggressive works of man are but as paper walls. Against the coral-reef barrier, erosive equatorial currents, tidal waves, and all the battalions of ocean may charge in vain.

The natives call their country Viti (pronounced Veety.) It is to be regretted that the harsher sounding word “Fiji,” applied by the Tongans from the Friendly Islands, has been adopted in its stead by us, inasmuch as “Viti” is a good representative word of the euphonious characteristic of the language, in the most perfect and widely-known dialect, in which there is hardly a harsh sound to be heard.

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As I rambled about the mountain solitudes, the sound of the lali, or native drum, beaten in celebration of some heathen rite, and faint echoes from the shrill blast of the conch-shell, blown in honour of some chiefly observance, not infrequently floated up from an extensive valley lying in the centre of the hill country. Occasionally I had seen men moving in the distance, but I was always careful to keep out of view.