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If visitors or friends caught or brought with them either of these fish, a child of the family would be taken and laid down in an unheated oven, as a peace-offering to Moso for the indignity done to him by the strangers.
Moso could bear it no longer, and, when close upon daybreak, went on shore and searched from house to house, feeling for a man whose body had not been freshened by a bath the night before but was rough with saline matter from the ocean. He found him, dragged him away, killed him, and smote at the same time all the people of the place.
If it came about in the morning or the evening it was a sign that their prayers were accepted. If it did not come Moso was supposed to be angry. The bird did not appear at noon owing to the glare of the sun. The priest interpreted to the family the meaning of the chirps as his inclination or fancy dictated. Long Moso was the name of another family god.
Moso was also a household god in some families. In one he was incarnate as a man. He helped himself to food of any kind from the plantations of his neighbours, and, if chased, suddenly disappeared; and hence they considered he was a god, and prayed to him and laid down offerings. In another family Moso was said to appear, but only one old man could discern him when he came.
The Moso girls wore their black hair cut short on the sides and hanging in long narrow plaits down their backs. The guests were seated in groups of six on the stones of the temple courtyard. Small boys acted as waiters, passing about steaming bowls of vegetables and huge straw platters heaped high with rice.
"Oh Moso! make haste, show your power, send down to the lower regions, sweep away like a flood, may they never see the light of another day." These were the usual imprecations shrieked out over the bowl. One of the kings of the district of Atua was supposed to be a man and move about among mortals in the daytime; but at night he was Moso, and away among the gods.
"Thank you," I say, "but I am looking for my plantain. Will you have the boy find it, there are so many things in this basket?" A few words between the "moso" and the Baron, the latter smiles a little. "Très curieux, dthat old voman forget to put in dthat plantain!" Mrs. Steele's amusement is most offensive.
This region is nearly the extreme western limit of the Moso tribe which appears not to extend across the Mekong River. The mandarin at Wei-hsi received us hospitably and proved to be one of the most courteous officials whom we met in Yün-nan. We were sorry to learn that he was killed in a horrible way only a few weeks after our visit.
Another story is told of a man of this district who had been long on Tutuila, and wished to return to Savaii, but was always refused a passage when a canoe happened to be going. He implored the god Moso to pity and help him. "Come on my back," said Moso; and away Moso went with him, and after a swim of a hundred miles set him down in the evening on the rocks at his own place.
If any member of the family tasted of these sacred fish he was sentenced by the heads of the family to drink a cupful of rancid oil dregs as a punishment and to stay the wrath of Moso. NAFANUA Hidden inland. This was the name of the goddess of a district in the west end of the island of Savaii.
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