Hidden Mangaian "Janus"
p. 19 · Read in the full issue
Of Heathen Days
From Our Own Correspondent IN a deep cave at Ivirua Village lies hidden an old Maori artifact that the Bishop Museum would give its butter rations for the duration to get.
This is a two-faced, grey-stone human figure, about life size, before which stands a large stone bowl, blackened by fire.
This writer believes that an image sculp tured to face both ways is unique in Poly nesia. The effigy is highly “tabu,” as also is the cave it is in.
The likelihood of this Janus seeing the glass-cases of Honolulu Museum is very remote, therefore. But if it could be got out, what a fluttering there’d be in the ethnological dove-cotes!