ABSTRACT
At Sa’a and Ulawa they postulate the existence of two kinds of ghosts, both of which are called ghosts, akalo, but only one of them is an object of worship. The first kind is the ordinary akalo, the ghost of the dead, the second is the ghost whose abode is in the forest. Every person at death becomes an akalo, and they speak of akalona a ola, So-and-So’s ghost, the possessive pronoun being suffixed to the word akalo. In the incantations the phrase akaloku, my ghost, appears, where the word akalo is used to denote the life principle, the soul. After the death of a person, his ghost is credited with the power of speech, as in the Ulawa story of the woman whose husband gave her no help in the work of the house or garden, but was for ever fishing. So she plucked the areca nut which causes death, and ate and died of it. She appeared and talked to her grandfather, who, after the usual fashion in such cases, failed to recognize her as a ghost, and bid her stay with him, but she said she had to follow her father and mother and went on to Malapa-of-the-dead.
