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When food was brought in, no water was to be spilled on the doorstep. It would make the protecting god Tu angry, and cause him to go off. In another family he was incarnate in the domestic fowl, and if any of them ate a piece of fowl the consequence was delirium and death. In another family Moso was incarnate in the cuttle-fish, and none of them dared to eat one.
The root of the word is the name of a tree "Cananga odorata" the yellow flowers of which are highly fragrant. A stone was his representative in one village, on which passing travellers laid down a scented wreath or necklace as an offering to Moso.
"Madame," says the Peruvian quietly to Mrs. Steele, "no von here drink vater; it makes always fery seeck," and he signs to the servant to serve the next course. "I despise vino blanco," I say; "I'd as soon drink weak vinegar." Nevertheless I sip my second glass, as there is no prospect of anything else. A "moso" comes in with a big basket containing our purchases.
It is to be hoped that his collections, which must be of great scientific value and importance, have arrived at a place of safety long ere this book issues from the press. We hired four Moso hunters in the Snow Mountain village.
The Samoan Moso is incarnate in half a dozen different objects, and some deities are incarnate in men. As for the title "father," it belongs of course to the object from which a clan is supposed to be descended.
A prayer was thus expressed: "O Moso, be propitious; let this my daughter be preserved alive! Be compassionate to us; save my daughter, and we will do anything you wish as our redemption price." Offerings to the god, as we have already seen, were regulated by the caprice and covetousness of the cunning priest.
Although the Moso hunter, who acted as our guide, assured us that the river was only three miles away, it proved to be more than fifteen, and we did not reach the ferry until half past one the next afternoon. We were continually annoyed, as every traveler in China is, by the inaccuracy of the natives, and especially of the Chinese. Their ideas of distance are most extraordinary.
"Go and bring me a bunch of cocoa-nuts, that is all I want," said Moso; but the ungrateful man went on shore, and when he got among the houses and the people forgot all about his benefactor, who was waiting patiently for the cocoa-nuts.
In another place Moso's representative was a large wooden bowl, decorated with white shells, and called Lipi, or sudden death, as described under Le Fe'e, No. 8. The priest received offerings from the injured, and, in lieu of them, prayed to Moso with loud crying and forced tears to curse with sudden death the unknown thief or other injurer.
The Baron buys a great tray full of these things, and hires a barefooted "moso" to carry them down to the wharf. We go on to the garden-planted Plaza that had so attracted us by day. Now it is a blaze of light and resonant with the strains of a Mexican band. Dark-visaged idlers lounge on the long seats about the garden, and a constantly shifting throng moves up and down on every side.
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