At great festivals it is not uncommon for the women to wrestle together in pairs. Finow, king of Tonga, ordered a mock fight, in which fifteen hundred women were ranged on each side. They gave fair hits, without pulling each other’s hair, and kept up the contest about an hour, without an inch of ground being lost by either side. In the Radack islands women fight not merely for pastime, but in good earnest. They station themselves behind the men, beating drums, and throwing stones gathered in baskets for the purpose. When the combat is ended, they throw themselves in as mediators between the conquerors and the vanquished. When a person of superior rank is ill, it is customary for his relations to cut off a joint of the little finger, as a sacrifice to the gods for his recovery. Even little children will quarrel for the honor of laying their finger upon a block of wood, and having a joint cut off with an axe, or sharp stone. As soon as a person dies, the air is rent with the shrieks and lamentations of friends and dependents. The house is hung with coarse brown _gnatoo_ striped with black, and the mourners, as an indication of wretchedness and gloom, wear the most ragged and dirty mats they can find. They pluck out the hair, beat their faces till they become black and swollen, and disfigure themselves in a frightful manner with gashes made by sharp shells. Very handsome women sometimes, in the excess of their grief, destroy every vestige of their beauty. In the Feejee islands, when a chief dies, custom requires that his principal wife should be strangled and buried with him. Powerful friends, by the offer of very valuable gifts, may save the widow from this fate; but in many cases they are unable to do it, and in others the victim makes it a point of honor to be sacrificed. In the Sandwich islands, it was formerly the practice to immolate a number of slaves on the grave of the king and queen; but this custom has been abolished by the influence of the missionaries. The graves are decorated with flowers, and carefully kept in order with smooth layers of black and white pebbles gathered from the beach.