Chapter XII

, that myth moves in the realm of the supernatural, or better, super-normal, and that magic bridges over the gap between that and present-day reality. Now this statement acquires a new importance; magic appears to us as the essence of traditional continuity with ancestral times. Not only, as I have emphasised in this chapter, is it never conceived as a new invention, but it is identical in its nature with the supernatural power which forms the atmosphere of mythical events. Some of this power may have been lost on its way down to our times--mythical stories relate how it has been lost; but never has anything been added to it. There is nothing in it now which has not been in it in the ancient, hoary times of myth. In this the natives have a definitely regressive view of the relation between now and before; in this they have their counterpart to a Golden Age, and to a Garden of Eden of sorts. Thus we fall back upon the recognition of the same truth, whether we approach the matter by looking for beginnings of magic, or by studying the relations between the present and the mythical reality. Magic is a thing never invented and never tampered with, by man or any other agency.

This, of course, means that it is so in native belief. It hardly needs explicitly stating that in reality magic must constantly change. The memory of men is not such, that it could hand over verbally exactly what it had received, and, like any other item of traditional lore, a magical formula is in reality constantly being re-shaped as it passes from one generation to another, and even within the mind of the same man. As a matter of fact, even from the material collected by me in the Trobriands, it can be unmistakably recognised that certain formulæ are much older than others, and indeed, that some parts of spells, and even some whole spells, are of recent invention. Here I cannot do more than refer to this interesting subject, which, for its full development, needs a good deal of linguistic analysis, as well as of other forms of "higher criticism."

All these considerations have brought us very near to the essential problem: what does magic really mean to the natives? So far, we have seen that it is an inherent power of man over those things which vitally affect him, a power always handed over through tradition. [81] About the beginnings of magic they know as little, and are occupied as little as about the beginnings of the world. Their myths describe the origin of social institutions and the peopling of the world by men. But the world is taken for granted, and so is the magic. They ask no questions about magiogony any more than they do about cosmogony.

IV

So far we have not gone beyond the examination of myths and of what we can learn from them about the nature of magic. To gain a deeper insight into this subject, we must study more closely the concrete data about magical performance. Even in the foregoing chapters a sufficient material has been collected to allow of correct inferences, and I shall only here and there have to allude to other forms of magic, besides that of canoe, Kula and sailing.

I have spoken so far about "magic" in a wholesale manner, as if it were all of one piece. As a matter of fact, magic all the world over, however rudimentary or developed it might be, presents three essential aspects. In its performance there enter always some words spoken or chanted, some actions carried out, and there are always the minister or ministers of the ceremony. In analysing the concrete details of magical performances, therefore, we have to distinguish the formula, the rite, and the condition of the performer.

These three factors stand out quite clearly and definitely in the Trobriand magic, whether we examine the facts themselves or the natives' way of looking at them. It may be said at once that in this society the relative importance of the three factors is not quite the same. The spell is by far the most important constituent of magic. In their linguistic use, although these natives have a special word, yopa, they very often use the word magic, megwa, to describe a spell. The spell is the part of the magic which is kept secret and known only to the esoteric circle of practitioners. When a magic is handed over, whether by purchase, gift, or inheritance, only the spell has to be taught to the new recipient, and as already once said before, it is usually taught in instalments, while the payment is received in that manner. When one speaks about magical knowledge, or in inquiries whether an individual knows some magic, this invariably refers to the formula, for the nature of the rite is always quite public property. Even from the examples given in this book, it can be seen how simple are the rites and how elaborate often the formulæ. To direct questions on the subject, the natives always reply that the spell is the more important part. The question: "where is the real strength of magic?" would receive the reply: "in the spell." The condition of the magician is, like the rite, essential to the performance of the magic, but it also is considered by the natives as subservient to the spell.

All this must be made clearer by the examination of actual facts. First of all, let us examine the relation between spell and rite; and to this purpose it will be best to group the various magical performances into several classes according to the complexity of the concomitant rite. We shall begin with the simplest rites.

Spells uttered directly without concomitant rite.--We had one or two examples of such magic where the performer simply utters a formula directly into space. For example, the communal magician of the kaloma (spondylus shell) fishing performs the first act by walking on the beach and reciting his spell towards the sea. In the moment of actual shipwreck, before abandoning the canoe, the toliwaga launches his last kayga'u directly into the elements. Again, he lets his voice float over the waters, when invoking the marvellous fish, who will bring the drowning party to some friendly shore. The final spell of the Kula, by which the approaching canoe 'shakes the mountain,' chanted by a trio of magical reciters, is thrown directly towards the Koya. The clearing of the sea in the kaloma fishing is also done this way, and many more examples could be adduced from garden magic, wind magic, and other classes not described in this book.

The natives have a special expression for such acts; they say that the formula is recited 'by the mouth only,' 'o wadola wala.' This form of magic with such a rudimentary rite is, however, relatively uncommon. Although one could say that there is no rite at all in such cases, for the magician does not manipulate anything or perform any

## action beyond speaking, yet from another point of view, the whole

performance is ritual in so far as he has always to cast his voice towards the element, or being, which he addresses. Indeed here, as in all other cases, the voice of the reciter has to be somehow or other conveyed to the object which he wishes to becharm. We see, moreover, that in all these instances, the nature of this object is such that it can be directly reached by the voice, whilst on the other hand, there would be some difficulty in applying any substance or performing any action over, let us say, wind, or a shell growing on a distant reef or the Koya (mountain).

Spells accompanied by simple rites of impregnation.--A large number of the cases described in this book falls under this heading. We saw quite at the beginning (