Chapter IX

, Division III), seemed to me over-stated, when he is said to be "supreme," to have "the right of determining an expedition," and especially when it is said that he "had the right of first choice of a canoe." This latter phrase must involve a misunderstanding; as we saw, each sub-clan (that is, each sub-division of the village) build their own canoe, and a subsequent swapping and free choice are out of the question. Mr. Gilmour was fully acquainted with the facts of the Kula, as I learnt from personal conversation. In this article, he mentions it only in one phrase, saying that some of the expeditions "were principally concerned in the exchange of the circulated articles of native wealth ... in which trade was only a secondary consideration."

[97] Mr. Gilmour's statement to the contrary namely that "the trips from the West--Kavataria and Kaileuna--were pure trading expeditions" (loc. cit.)--is incorrect. First, I am inclined to think that some of the Kavataria men did make the Kula in the Amphletts, where they always stopped on their way South, but this might have been only on a very small scale, and entirely overshadowed by the main object of the expedition, which was the trade with the Southern Koya. Secondly, as to the natives of Kayleula, I am certain that they made the Kula, from conclusive data collected both in the Trobriands and in the Amphletts.

[98] I have given a more detailed description of this process which I had often opportunities to observe among the Mailu on the South coast. I never saw the making of an armshell in the Trobriands, but the two processes are identical according to detailed information which I obtained. (Compare the monograph on "The Natives of Mailu" by the Author, in the Transactions of the Royal Society of S. Australia, 1915, pp. 643-644.)

[99] Both statements of Professor Seligman in the "Melanesians" (p. 89) are in entire agreement with the information I obtained among the Mailu. See Transactions of the Royal Society of S. Australia, 1915, pp. 620-629.

[100] Also in the before quoted article in the Economic Journal, March, 1921.