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Walter E. Traprock - The Cruise of the Kawa
designed to confine the activities of the countless Alice-blue wart-hogs which whined plaintively about
our feet. At a majestic gesture from the chief the taa-taas were furled (becoming
naa-naas), and we halted in a bright clearing about sixty feet in diameter, plainly the public square,
or, to be exact, circle.
My first impression was that of complete isolation in an unbroken forest. Peer as I would, I could discern
no sign of human habitation. We had arrived, but where? My question was soon answered. By most
gracious gestures, soft sounds and a series of fluttering finger exercises on the abdominal walls we were
led to one side of the circle where, as our guides pointed upward, white eyes for the first time in history
rested on a Filbertine dwelling!
The houses were in the trees!
Architecture is said to express deeply the inner characteristics of a people, a statement I am glad to
corroborate. But never had it struck me so forcibly as now. Gazing up at a dim picture of informal
construction, interlaced and blended with the trunks, boughs and foliage of the overarching palms I saw
at a glance the key-note of the life of this simple people - absence of labor.
The houses, - nests, were the better word - were formed by a most naive adaptation of natural
surroundings to natural needs. The curving fronds of the towering coco-palms and panjandrus had been
interlaced; and nature did the rest, the gigantic leaves interweaving, blending, over-lapping, meeting in a
passionate and successful desire to form a roof, proof alike against sun and rain. Some ten feet below this
and an equal distance from the ground the tendrils of the eva-eva vine had been led from tree to
tree, the subordinate fibres and palpitating feelers quickly knitting themselves into a floor with all the
hygienic properties and tensile strength of linen-mesh.
Access to these apartments was something of a puzzle until, to instruct us, a tall Filbert, who was
evidently to be our neighbor, approached a nearby dwelling and, seizing a pendent halyard of
eva-eva, gently but firmly pulled down the floor to a convenient level, vaulted into the
hammock-like depression and was immediately snapped into privacy. From below we could see the
imprint of his form rolling toward the center of his living-room and then the depressions of his feet as he
proceeded to lurch about his dwelling.
It was now mid-afternoon; we were hot, tired, and, though we did not know it, mildly intoxicated by the
inhalations of alova which we had absorbed during our journey. I looked forward eagerly to getting
up-stairs, so to speak, and taking a sound nap. One thing only deterred me; I was thirsty.
On the edge of the clearing I heard the tinkling of a brook. Walking to its edge, I knelt and dipped my hot
wrists in the cold stream, wetting my hands, face and matted locks, while the natives eyed me solemnly
but with, I thought, looks of anxiety. And then a strange thing happened. As I took off my duck's-back
fishing hat, filled it to the brim and raised it to my lips, a cry of horror burst from the throats of those
swarthy giants. The chief strode forward and dashed the cap from my hand, at the same time thundering
the word "Bapoo!"
In an instant it flashed upon me that this was Filbertese for tapu or taboo, that strange,
sacred kibosh which is laid on certain acts, objects or localities throughout these far-flung islands. Water
it appeared was for drinking purposes - bapoo. I then did what I think was exactly the right thing
under the circumstances, namely, to wring out the offending head-covering and throw it as far from me
as possible, an act which was greeted with a hearty burst of applause.
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