There is little wonder that in this stronghold Ingova was able to defy his enemies, and with his army of head-hunters carry terror into the villages of his neighbours, but of these exploits anon.
Tambu houses are also built and used as meeting-houses, and being freed from “taboo,” in the sense that any one may enter them, they are used by the young men of the village as a kind of rendezvous, and crowds of natives can always be seen lounging about in them or sitting in rows gossiping. They are also used for general meetings, councils, and certain ceremonies. It is customary, and etiquette, to go direct to the tambu house on arriving at a village, and there, before the crowd, state your business. In this way you are sure to win the good opinion of the natives. There are always { 91} plenty of them waiting to hear anything of interest.
[Illustration 28: OLD INGOVA’S WAR CANOE HOUSE, RUBIANA LAGOON, NEW GEORGIA, SOLOMON ISLANDS.
Fifteen years or more ago, old Ingova, the notorious head-hunting chief of Rubiana lagoon, was about at the height of his power, and his raids of slaughter to neighbouring islands were of dreadful frequency. It was to this canoe house that he returned after a successful expedition in his great TOMAKO (war canoes) laden with ghastly trophies, but ever since Rear-Admiral Davis, then of H.M.S. _Royalist_, sacked this place in 1891, all has been comparatively quiet, though I did hear, while I was there, that Ingova had led a head-hunting raid or two.
The old shed, for it looks very like one, stands near the margin of the lagoon, not far from the fringe of the thick bush and forest. All is fast falling into decay, and the whole place has a haunted feeling about it. Inside was an old war canoe and the remains of former splendour. Till you came to look carefully at the structure its size did not strike you, but I found it was about 72 feet long by 30 broad, and quite 30 odd feet to the top pitch of the roof; the high slots above the two doors were made to let out the tall fore-peaks of the canoes.]
The erection of a tambu house is generally an excuse for a big festival, and at one time required a human head to be sacrificed and eaten, and was thus the cause of many a head-hunting expedition.