The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead

Marques

ana de Neyra in 1595, but, so far as appears, it was not again visited by Europeans until 1774, when Captain Cook touched at the islands on his second voyage. Curiously enough, the north-westerly group, of which Nukahiva is the largest and most important island, remained unknown until 1791, when it was discovered by the American Captain Ingraham, who named the group the Washington Islands. About a month

r luxuriant green offering an agreeable contrast to the bareness and aridity of the frowning precipices and sharp peaks which soar above them. Cascades tumbling from high cliffs into the depths of the glens add to the beauty and charm of the scenery. So steep and precipitous are the ridges which divide these smiling vales from each other that the ascent and descent are in many places both difficult and dangerous even for the natives; European mountaineers need to have stout limbs and steady heads to accomplish them in safety. Hence in former days each valley contained a separate tribe, which was commonly in a state of permanent hostility towards its neighbours across the mountain barriers.[2] Of these tribes the most famous were the warlike and dreaded Taipiis or Typees, who occupied a beautiful valley at the eastern end of Nukahiva, and in their mountain fastness deemed themselves inaccessible to the

lend an autumnal air to the landscape, which yet is never chilled by hoar frosts or saddened by the sight of bare boughs and fallen leaves.[7] Even in the hottest days a cool wind blows from the sea, and at night there is a breeze from the land. Rain falls during some months of the year, especially from May or June to August or September; but on the whole there is little variation in the seasons;[8] the Marquesan year has been described as one long tropical mont

Appearance o

e same effect the naturalist George Forster, who accompanied Captain Cook, gives his impression of a crowd of Marquesan men, among whom were no women. He says: "They were tall, and extremely well limbed; not one of them unwieldy or corpulent like a Taheitian, nor meagre and shrivelled like a native of Easter Island. The punctuation" (by which he meant the tattooing) "which almost entire

Nireus fui

s ab

o

overed their whole body, from head to foot. These punctures were disposed with the utmost regularity; so that the marks on each leg, arm, and cheek, and on the corresponding muscles, were exa

ven inches, but most commonly six feet two or three inches, and every way proportioned. Their faces are remarkably handsome, with keen, piercing eyes; teeth white, and more beautiful than ivory; countenances open and expressive, which reflect every emotion of their souls; limbs which might serve as models for a statuary, and strength and activity proportioned to their appearance."[16] Another observer remarks of them that "the natives bear the palm for personal beauty from most other of the Polynesian tribes. The men are tall and muscular, though rather slightly framed; their deportment is graceful and independent; their features are handsome, and partake more of the European regularity of profile than is usual with Polynesian islanders."[17] The nose is straight or aquiline, sometimes short or slightly flattened, but never ill-shaped: the mouth is never large nor the lips thick: the forehead is rather low and somewhat retreating.[18] The hair is almost always straight or wavy; men or wome

ns, Tools, House

t staples, bread-fruit and fish. The natives do not readily accustom themselves to a European diet; indeed when the experiment has been made of feeding them exclusively in our manner, they have wasted away and only recovered their health when they were allowed to return to their usual nourishment. Their ordinary beverage was water, but they were also addicted to the drinking of kava, which was extracted from the root of the Piper methysticum in the usual fashion.[23] Drawing their sustenance chiefly from the bread-fruit tree, the Marquesans paid little attention to the cultivation of the soil; however, they grew a certain amount

wedge or mortise-chisel, and was fastened to the haft by coco-nut fibre. Some of these axes weighed as much as twenty-five pounds. The natives also used sharp-edged or toothed shells as cutting implements, and borers made of pointed bones; while rough fish-skins served them as polishers.[28] Like the rest of the Polynesians, they kindled fire by the method known as the stick-and-groove, that is, by rubbing the sharp point of one stick against the flat surface of another, so as to form a groove in

o short walls close the house at either end. The door is in the middle of the front wall, and is so low that it is necessary to stoop in entering. Sometimes the fronts of the houses are entirely open except for the low pillars which support the roof. The interior of the house forms a single chamber undivided by partitions. Two trunks of coco-nut palms extend parallel to each other along the whole length of the floor at an interval of four or five feet; the innermost log,

would do no discredit to European masons.[31] Sometimes the stones are described as enormous blocks of rock,[32] some of which would require ten or twel

es these raised dwellings resembled the ordinary Marquesan house in structure; at other times they were quadrangular, with perpendicular walls and an ordinary roof. They were approached by ladders and resembled the habitations in use amo

h Sea islanders in the arts of canoe-building and navigation.[36] This inferiority may perhaps have been partly due to the absence of those lagoons which, formed by coral reefs, elsewhere enabled the natives to acquire confidence and skill in sailing on smooth and sheltered waters. The same cause may also, perhaps, explain why fishing was comparatively little practised by the Marquesans. We are told that as an occupation it was

, Adoption, Ex

e years has less than two husbands,-sometimes she has three, but such instances are not frequent." He seems to have attributed the practice to a scarcity of women; for he tells us that "the males considerably outnumber the females."[39] The same view was taken at a later date by Dr. Clavel, who observes: "In the islands where the women are in a minority we may to this day observe tolerably numerous cases of polyandry. Thus at Ua-Una I met some women who had each two husbands, almost always one of them young and the other old. Such households of three are not worse than the rest and never give rise to intestine dissensions."[40] According to Radiguet, the right of having more husbands than one was not general and hardly belonged to any but chieftainesses,[41] but this limitation is denie

fers from neighbours, and often knocked down the infant to the highest bidder; for the adopting parents regularly made presents to the child's family, consisting of cloth, tools, and pigs, according to the fortune of the contracting parties. After birth the child re

enjoyment of each other's property and even of their wives, if they happened to be married men. The custom was not limited to the natives; they readily exchanged names with Europeans and granted them the privileges which flowed from the pact. It is

Dancing-places,

llages, and which formed the scene of public entertainments. In these contests each runner or combatant tried to get in the way of his adversary, and, balancing himself on one stilt, to strike his rival with the other, so as to bring him to the ground amid the laughter and jeers of the spectators. It has sometimes been supposed that the use of stilts in the Marquesas originated in the practical purpose of enabling people to cross a stream

f this kind are the most fashionable and favourite amusements at the Washington and the Marquesan groups. Every inhabited district has its Tahua, or public square of this kind; some of them so extensive, it is said, as to be capable of accommodating ten thousand people."[47] Again, speaking of another of these dancing-places, the same writer observes, "This Tahua, or theatre, is a structure altogether superior to that visited by us yesterday, and so massive and well built as to be capable of enduring for ages. It is a regular oblong square, about sixty feet in length and forty broad. The outer wall consists of immense stones, or slabs of rock, three feet high, and many of them four or six feet long, joined closely together and hewn with a regularity and ne

nsisted of blocks of stone, several feet broad, laid so neatly and so close together that you might have imagined it to be the work of European master-masons.[49] Radiguet describes one such dancing-place as

urrounding villages inviting the inhabitants to attend the festival. Immense numbers of hogs were killed and huge troughs filled with bread-fruit were provided by the hosts for the banquet. The festivals were attended not only by the people of the particular valley in which they were held, but by the inhabitants of other valleys and even of other islands; for so long as a festival lasted, a special taboo forbade the natives to harm the strangers in their mi

d to the Areois of the Society Islands.[54] The dances were accompanied by the beating of drums and the songs of a chorus, it might be of a hundred and fifty singers, who sat on the upper platform along with the chiefs and warriors. Sometimes in the intervals between the dances a choir of women, seated on an adjoining and elevated platform, would chant in dull monotonous tones, clapping their hands loudly in unison with their song. The subjects of the songs were various and were often furnished by some passing event, such as the arrival of a ship or any less novel incident. Not unfrequently,

r four to six, eight, twelve, and even fifteen feet in height. The blocks of stone put together to form the platforms were sometimes enormous, many of them measuring eight feet long by four feet thick and wide; and they were hewn and polished into such perfect form as to excite the wonder of the European beholder, who reflected with astonishment on the vast labour requisite to bring these huge rocks from the sea and to chisel them into shape without the help of iron tools. Access to the platforms was afforded by slop

ial Rank

nly on their superior wealth, particularly on their landed property; for the larger their estates, the greater the number of the tenants whose services they could command. Hence the government has been called aristocratic and compared to the feudal system.[58] In a fruitful season the chiefs had a right to a fourth part of

consequences on the transgressor. The interdiction might be either public or private. To give examples of public interdictions, when the quantity of breadfruit, on which the people depended for their subsistence, was from any cause seriously diminished in a district, the chief had the right to impose a taboo on bread-fruit trees for twenty months, during which no one might gather the fruit. This close time allowed the trees to recover their strength and fertility. Similarly, if fish were scarce, the chief might pronounce a taboo on the neighbouring bay, or a part of it, in order to allow the fish to multiply undisturbed and replenish the sea in the neighbourhood of human habitations. Again, in the prospect of a great festival, a chief might lay an interdict on pigs for two or three years in advance, in order that, when the time came, there might be plenty of pork for

e name of the person, and nobody ventures to attack it. If any one is so irreligious as to break through a taboo, and should be convicted of it, he is called kikino; and the kikinos are always the first to be devoured by the enemy, at least they believe it to be so, nor is it impossible that the priests should so arrange matters as that this really happens."[66] Again, if a man's pig had been stolen, and he suspected who had done the deed, he would lay a taboo on the swine or other property of the thief by giving his own name, or the name

intention and determined to frustrate it, called out after her, "The road from here to the police-office is your father." On hearing that, the woman at once stopped short, for under no circumstances would she dare to trample on the author of her being. On the contrary, she immediately roasted two little pigs and carried them to the tomb of her father as an offering to appease his

but they fled in horror if it were even shown to them. Their horror was explained by a tradition that once on a time a great chief of the tribe had been out fishing with his people, when a gigantic sting ray upset their canoes and

gion and

human soul, and on the other hand some of our best authorities on the Marquesans have stated that the taboo was believed to be an expression of the will of the gods conveyed to the people through the

orizon, they are firmly convinced that their ships come from the clouds; and they imagine that thunder is occasioned by the cannonading of vessels which float in the atmosphere, on which account they entertain a great dread of artillery."[72] The atuas or deities of the Marquesans, we are told by another writer, "are numerous and vary in their character and powers. Besides those having dominion respectively, as is supposed, over the different elements and their most striking phenomena, there are atuas of the mountain and of the forest, of the sea-side and of

is pointed out at the foot of a bold cliff, high in the mountains. The Rev. Mr. Crook gives the following account of an Atua, at the island of Tahuata, in the Windward or Marquesan group, while he resided there temporarily in 1797, as a missionary from the London Missionary Society: 'He is now of great age, and has lived from early life at Hanateiteina, in a large house surrounded by an enclosure called the A. In the house is an altar, and from the beams within and upon the trees around it are human carcasses, suspended with their heads downward and scalped. No one enters the premises but his servant, except when human sacrifices are offered. Of these, more are offered to him than to any other of their gods, and he frequently seats himself on an elevated scaffold in front of his house and calls for two or three at a time. He is invoked

the element; but he failed to elude the vigilance of its guardian and was obliged to resort to force to extort the boon from him. In the struggle which ensued Mahoike lost an arm and a leg, and to save his remaining limbs he consented to give fire to the victorious Maui. At the same time he offered to rub it on Maui's leg;

the function of prophecy they combined the office of physician or rather of exorciser. For every internal disorder was believed to be inflicted by some god, who had taken possession of the sufferer's person; and the tauas, or high priests, as we may call them, were called in to heal the patient by ridding him of the divinity who had entered into him. This they commonly did by feeling for the mischievous deity till they found him, when they smothered him between the palms of their hands.[79] Sometimes the good physician would converse with the spirit whom he had thus caught between his hands, and would elicit from him in conversation the cause of the sickness, which usually consisted in some breach of taboo, such as a theft of bread-fruit or coco-nuts from a sacred tree. At the same time the affable spirit would reveal to the physician the penalty

, Death, and

y tall, and the people very handsome; there they sing songs to music sweeter than ours. Ah! when shall I be able to return to Tiburones?" On another occasion a woman's soul appeared to a priest to inform him that she had committed the heinous crime of eating a fowl, but that she would expiate the sacrilege by an early death. The French authorities summoned both the priest and the wom

er to delay its departure and so to prolong the life of its owner, affectionate relatives use

blood trickled down.[86] Captain Porter saw a woman with deep wounds still unhealed, which she had inflicted on her neck, breast, and arms for the loss of her husband, who had been devoured by a shark.[87] After the death, too, the widow would place herself in front of the corpse, and three or four girls would surround her; whereupon they would all engage in a lascivious dance, with outstretched arms, tripping in cadence to the accompaniment of a funeral hymn or lamentation, which was chanted by a choir in honour of the dead. After executing the dance, which would seem to have been intended to attract the attention of the deceased and recall his wandering spirit, they would stoop over the corpse, and cry, "He has not stirred! He stirs not. Alas! alas! he is no more." It was only after they had thus practised their seductions in vain on the dead man that the widow gave way to her frantic outburst of sorrow by mauling herself with a sort of saw.[88] This funeral dance a widow was apparently expected to renew in public at every festival for months after the death. At a festival, which he called the Feast of Calabashes, Melville saw four or five old women, stark naked, holding themselves erect and leaping stiffly into the air, with their arms pressed close to their sides, like sticks bobbing up and down in water. They preserved the utmost gravity of countenance, and continued their strange movem

our it was customary to offer him food, in the shape of breadfruit paste and other dainties, which were wrapped up in leaves, hung on the edge of the coffin, and frequently renewed.[91] On the third night after the death a priest, stepping out on the terrace in front of the house, implored the wandering soul of the deceased to depart;

mbling of a long speech in an unintelligible language accompanied by the constant beating of drums.[94] Among the victuals provided for the funeral feast special importance appears to have been attached to the head of a pig, which was cut off and attached to the bier.[95] We are told that

kept for weeks in the house, where, in spite of the stench, the family continued to eat, drink, and sleep beside it. Sometimes, however, and perhaps more usually, the body was transferred to a small house or shed adjoining the dwelling of the deceased, where it received the necessary attentions. Finally, it was removed to a little hut or shed, where the bier was supported on posts under a thatched roof. To be buried in the earth was a mark of ignominy reserved at most for a young

intment was performed by night, while during the day the body was exposed to the sun on the stone platform of the house. The products of decomposition were carefully received in vessels and carried away to the place of sepulture; and the corpse was gradually eviscerated through the rectum. The friction was continued until the desiccated body was reduced to the state of a mummy, though sometimes, in spite of all precautions, it crumbled into dust. If the operation was successful, the mummy, wrapt in many bandages, was covered by a second canoe attached to the first, and was then placed on a scaffold in a morai or sanct

ed by no special rule.[102] The morai or burial-place of ordinary people was near their houses, and not far from it was a taboo-house, where the men feasted on the flesh of pigs.[103] But the cemeteries of chiefs were situated in the int

rk, twenty feet or more square and four or five high, surmounted in the centre by eight or ten posts arranged in the shape of a grave, and supporting at a height of six or seven feet a long and narrow roof of thatch. Close beneath this was the body enclosed in a coffin."[108] Again, in the island of Tahuata (Santa Christina), Bennett describes a chief's burial-place as follows: "A low but extensive stone platform, beneath the shade of a venerable fau-tree, marks the more consecrated ground; and on this is erected a wooden hut, containing an elevated trough, shaped as a canoe, and holding the perfect skeleton of the late chief. In front of the sepulchre are two hideous wooden idols, and several bundles of coco-nut leaves."[109] The shed, which was erected on the stone platform, and under which the body rested on a bier, seems to have consisted for the most part simply of a thatched roof supported on wooden posts.[110] Sometimes, however, instead of a simple shed, open on all sides, a small house resembling the ordinary houses of the natives appears to have been erected for the reception of the corp

of stone, with upright sides, not stepped or terraced. Megalithic monuments in the form of stepped or terraced pyramids seem to have been very rare in the Marquesas Islands; indeed, it is doubtful whether they existed at all. With regard to the island of Tahuata (Santa Christina), it is positively affirmed by Bennett that none of the v

long shape, are from ten to fifteen feet in length, and five or six feet thick. Their sides are quite smooth, but though square, and of pretty regular formation, they bear no mark of the chisel. They are laid together without cement, and here and there show gaps between. The topmost terrace and the lower one are somewhat peculiar in their construction. They have both a quadrangular depression in the centre, leaving the rest of the terrace elevated several feet above it. In the intervals of the stones immense trees have taken root, and their b

ompt explanation, and his attributing the work to a divine origin, at once convinced me that neither he nor the rest of his countrymen knew anything about them."[113] Melville was accordingly disposed to attribute the erection of these remarkable terraces to an extinct and forgotten race.[114] The hypothesis is all the more probable be

ointed out as burial-places to Melville, and he was told that the bodies "were deposited in rude vaults beneath the flagging, and were suffered to remain there without being disinterred. Although nothing could be more strange and gloomy than the aspect of these places, where the lofty trees threw their dark shadows over rude blocks of stone, a stranger looking at them would have discerned none of the ordinary evidences of a place of sepulture."[116] To the same effect, perhaps, Porter observes that, "when the flesh is mouldered from th

nce when an invasion of the enemy in force was expected, the custom was to remove the bodies from the morai and bury them elsewhere.[119] The heads of enemies killed in battle were invariably kept a

d afresh at the tomb, and the decorations were renewed, consisting of branches and leaves and strips of white bark-cloth, which waved like flags at the end of little white wands. At these anniversary feasts, to which, if the deceased was a man

f the Soul

e (popoi), pork, and fish, and offering the companionship of the most beautiful women imaginable. There the bread-fruit trees dropped their ripe fruit every moment to the ground, and the supply of coco-nuts and bananas never failed. There the souls reposed on mats much finer than those of Nukahiva; and every day they bathed in rivers of coco-nut oil. In that happy land there were plenty of plumes and feathers, and boars'-tusks, and sperm-whale teeth far better than even white men can boast of. The nether world, on the other hand, was peopled with deities of the second class and by ordinary human beings, who had no pretensions to gentility. But it was not a place of misery much less of punishment or torture; on the contrary, we are told that both t

e happy isles, but were never heard of again. On one occasion, for example, forty men in the island of Ua-pu, who had revolted against their chief and been defeated, embarked secretly by night and put to sea, hoping to discover the Fortunate Is

cle, they believed it to be an island, somewhere in the sky, abounding with everything desirable; that those killed in war and carried off by their friends, go there, provided they are furnished with a canoe and provisions; but that those who are carried off by the enemy, never reach it, unless a sufficie

seated in the stern of the most splendid canoe represented a priest who had been killed not long before by their enemies the Happahs. In the bottom of the priest's canoe Captain Porter found the putrefying bodies of two Taipiis (Typees) whom he and his men had recently killed in battle; and lying about the canoe he saw many other human carcasses, with the flesh still on them. The other canoes, he was told, belonged to different warriors who had been killed or had died not long since. "I asked them," continues Captain Porter, "why they had placed their effigies in the canoes, and also why they put the bodies of the dead Typees in that of the priest? They told me (as Wilson interpreted) that they were going to heaven, and that it was impossible to get there without canoes. The canoe of the priest being large, he was unable to manage it himself, nor was it right that he should, he being now a god. They had, therefore, placed in it the bodies of the Happas and Type

iss; one of them carried the chief's girdle, and the other bore the head of the pig that had been slaughtered for the funeral feast. The head was intended as a present to the warden of the infernal regions, who, if he did not get this perquisite, would

e idols. When the flesh of the first two are wasted away, the bones that remain are burnt. The custom of the country requires, that the men destined for sacrifice should belong to some neighbouring nation, and accordingly they are generally stolen. This occasions a war of six, and sometimes of twelve, months: its duration, how

ke. For this deity rules over a sort of submarine Eden, planted with all sorts of excellent fruits and beautified by the calm waters of an azure lake. The natives of Tahuata believe that the souls of all who die in the archipelago assemble on the top of a high mountain called Kiukiu. When a great multitude of souls is there gathered together, the sea opens and the souls fall plump down into the paradise of the goddess Upu. However, not all of them are permitted to enter the happy land and to enjoy the pleasures which it offers. Only such are admitted as have owned in their lifetime many servants and many pigs and have not been wicked. Further, none may enter in who bear on their body any marks of tattooing.[135] Hence the reason for flaying dead bodies seems to have been to efface, by removing the skin, the tattooed marks which would have acted as a fatal bar to the entrance of the ghost into paradise. As to the souls of slaves and the poor, in the opinion of the natives of Tahuata they go to a gloomy land, which is never illu

t the soul of a grandfather is transmitted by Nature into the body of his grandchildren; and that, if an unfruitful wife were to place herself under the corpse of her deceased grandfather, she would be sure to become pregnant."[139] Occasionally the soul of a dead person might even inhabit the body of an animal. Once when a whale was stranded on one of the islands, a priestess declared that

ss was deemed indispensable; it was his or her business to counteract a spell cast on a family, or to heal a sickness inflicted on an individual by one of these ghostly vagrants.[143] Such was the fear of wandering ghosts that no Marquesan would dare to stir a step abroad at night without the light of a torch; for well he knew that evil spirits lurked beside the path to knock down and throttle any rash wayfarer who should dare to leave his footsteps unillumined.[144] Indeed, we are told that, of all beliefs in the minds of the natives, the belief in ghosts was the most deeply rooted. It is impossible to express the dread which they felt of spectres and apparitions; nobody was exempt from it. But it was only at night that these

there, for such spots are believed to be constantly haunted by the ghosts of the departed. Nobody, it is said, would live in a house in which somebody has died; every such dwelling is immediately burnt down. Hence, when a person is grievously sick, a little pr

wizard would hold a conversation with the spirit, whose voice could be heard by the listeners, though his or her shape, as usual, was invisible in the darkness. Sceptics thought that such communications were made by mean

ained as in germ the whole theory an

ed as interpreters to the Russians and supplied them with most of the information which they give in their books concerning the customs and beliefs of the Marquesans. Roberts told them that he had been seven years in Nukahiva and two years previously in Santa Christina (Tau-ata); that he had been put ashore on the latter island out of an English merchant ship, the crew of which had mutinied against their captain and could not prevail upon him to join their party; and that in Nukahiva he had lately married a relation of the king's, by which he acquired great consideration, so that it would be easy for him to be of assistance to them. At the same time he earnestly warned them against the Frenchman, who had also resided for some years in Nukahiva, but whose character he painted in very dark colours. The two Russian captains, Krusenstern and Lisiansky, accordingly put their trust in Roberts and drew most of their information concerning the natives from him. On the other hand their na

t learn the language, he was able to employ as an interpreter an Englishman named Wilson, who had lived for many years in the islands, spoke the language of the natives with the same facility as his own, and had become a Marquesan in ever

Marquesas, having been the first missionary landed in the islands by the missionary ship Duff. During his residence in the islands Mr. Crook kept a journal, which he allowed Mr. Stewart to consult. The contents of the journal corroborated Mr. Stewart's own observations as to the inhabitants, and the

28th to March 4th, 1835; and his descriptions of what he saw are good so far as they go; but naturally he co

s and has given us, in a series of letters, an account of the native customs and beliefs, which, though fa

narrative of his experiences. His personal observations are valuable, but as he did not master the native languag

by MM. Vincendon-Dumoulin et C. Desgraz.[160] The authors had visited the islands with the expedition of the French navigator, J. Dumont d'Urville, in his ships the Astrolabe and the Zélée. But as the expedition stayed only about a week at Nukahiva, from August 26th to September 3rd, 1

unt of his experiences, which contains some valuable information as to the natives, their customs, religion, and mythology.[162] In the part which concerns the mythol

capacity of Resident for about six years (from 1868 to 1874) had ample time and opportunity for obtaining accurate information on the subject.[164] His work, though somewhat slight, is valuable so far as

l observations and collected information on the natives. These he subsequently published in a little work, which contains much of value;[166]

Marquesas. In his book of travel in the South Sea he has given us descriptions of the islands and the peo

TNO

thern Pacific Ocean, pp. lxxiii. sqq., 127 sqq.; A. J. von Krusenstern, Voyage round the World (London, 1813), i. 136; Vincendon-Dumoulin et C. Desgraz, ?les Marquises ou Nouka-hiva (Paris, 1843), pp. 1 sqq., 12 sq.; Le P. Mathias G--, Lett

sq., 17 sq., and passim (Everyman's Library); Vincendon-Dumoulin et C. Desgraz, op. cit. pp. 138 sq.; P. E. Eyriaud des Vergnes, op. cit. pp. 84 sq.; Clavel, Les Marquisiens (Paris, 1885) pp. 1 sq.; C. E. Meinicke, op. cit. ii. 236 sq.; F. H. H. Guillemard, op. cit. pp.

Cruise made to the Pacific Ocean, Secon

The first edition of this book was published in 1846. Melville

ud des Vergnes,

es (Paris, 1882), pp. 304 sq.; P. E.

s G--, op.

cit. p. 57. Compare M. Radiguet,

ville, Typ

sler, op. ci

iguet, op.

ok, Voyage

d the World (London, 1814), p. 85; G. H. von Langsdorff, Reise um die Welt (Frankfurt am Mayn, 1812), i. 92 sqq.; Fleur

lville, Ty

lville, Ty

orter, op. c

ennett, op.

iguet, op.

des Vergnes,

, op. cit. pp. 39 sq.; H

y of the women. But the general opinion appears to be that the Marquesan women are much

nnett, op. ci

. 115 sq.; Porter, op. cit. ii. 50-55; F. D. Bennett, op. cit. i. 316 sq.; H. Melville, Typee, pp. 120-124, 179; Vincendon-Dumoulin et C. Desgraz, op. cit. pp. 277 sq.; Mathias

3 sq.; F. D. Bennett, op. cit. i. 345 (who says that the only root the natives cultivate

337 sq.; Melville, Typee, pp. 158-160, 210; Mathias G--, op. cit. pp. 137 sq.; Radi

stern, op.

isiansky, op. cit. p. 88; Langsdorff, op. cit. i. 152 (bows and arr

it. i. 121; Krusenst

siens, pp. 11 sq. Compare G. Forster, op. cit. ii. 20; D

i. 109-111; Porter, op. cit. ii. 39 sq.; C. S. Stewart, op. cit. i. 209-211, 212, 267 sq.; Bennett, op. cit. i. 302 sq.; Melville, Typee, pp. 81-83; Vincendon-Dumoulin et C. Desgraz, op.

rff, op. cit

s G--, op.

ngsdorf

el, op. c

cit. i. 303 sq.; Baess

angsdorff, op. cit. i. 150; Porter, op. cit., ii. 12-14; Bennett, op

stern, op.

tewart, op.

le, Typee,

el, op. c

guet, op.

s G--, op.

Marquesas, see further E. Westermarck, History of Hum

op. cit. pp. 19 sq.; Clave

pp. 16 sq., 158 sq.; Cla

umoulin et C. Desgraz, op. cit. p. 284; Mathias G--, op. cit. p. 96. As for the ability of the natives to swim

ewart, op. ci

3 sq. Compare Vincendon-Dumoulin e

orff, op. c

uet, op. c

i. 318; Vincendon-Dumoulin et C. Desgraz, op. cit. pp. 264 sq.;

orff, op. c

cit. p. 231. Compare C. S. Stewart, op. c

above, pp

art, op. cit. i

te of nature, unassisted by any of those artificial means, which so much assist and facilitate the labour of the civilized man, could have conceived and executed a work, which, to every beholder, must appear stupendous. These piles are raised with views to magnificence alone; there does not appear to be the slightest utility attending them: the houses situated on them are unoccupied, except during the period of feasting, and they appear to belong to a public, without the whole efforts of which they could not hav

i. 132-134; Porter, op. cit. ii. 64; Melville, Typee, p. 199; Vincendon-Dumo

s G--, op.

nsky, op.

cit. pp. 79 sq.; Cla

. 47 sq.; Vincendon-Dumoulin

uet, op. c

Desgraz, op. cit. pp. 258 sq

op. cit. pp. 35 sq. Compar

orff, op. c

2. In this quotation I have alte

orff, op. c

ville, Typee, p. 230; Vincendon-Dum

el, op. c

l, op. cit

t. p. 258; Mathias G--, op. cit. p. 48; Radig

stern, op.

pare Vincendon-Dumoulin et C. Desgraz, op.

cipal harbour

226, 240 sq. The missionary William Crook was landed in the Marquesas from the missionary sh

s G--, op.

r, op. cit

most famous, and for some myths concerning them, see Mathias G--, op. cit. pp. 40 sqq.; Radiguet, op. cit. pp. 221 sq

245 sq.; Vincendon-Dumoulin et

ms to imply that the spirit whom the priestly physician cau

Stewart, op. cit. i. 247; Vincendon-Dumo

et, op. cit

lavel, op. cit. p. 44, note1. Com

; Eyriaud des Vergnes, op. cit. p. 58.

. 263; Vincendon-Dumoulin et C

cit. p. 284; Clav

r, op. cit

mary for a number of matrons to strip themselves naked and execute obscene dances at the door of the

le, Typee,

l, op. cit

el, op. c

et, op. cit

i. 265; Vincendon-Dumoulin et

orff, op. c

uet, op. c

ff, op. cit. i. 133; C. S. Stewart, op. cit. i. 265

gsdorff, op. cit. i. 133; Lisiansky, op. c

op. cit. i. 264, 266; Vincendon-Dumoulin et C. Desgraz, op. cit. p. 250. As for the custom of keeping the body for months in the ordinary house, surrounded by the family, see Radiguet, op. cit. p. 286. As to the practi

missionary Stewart saw a canoe-shaped coffin containing the remains of a man who had died many years before. It was raised on a bier of framework, at a height of two or three feet

. pp. 45 sq.; Baessle

cit. ii. 114 ("the gods at the burying-place, or morai, for so it is called by them"); Radiguet, op. cit. p. 52 ("un morai (sépulchre) en ruine"); Melville, Typee, p. 168 ("the 'mor

moulin et C. Desgr

to Krusenstern (op. cit. i. 127), the morais

, Narrative of a Wh

dorff, op.

moulin et C. Desgr

Captain Marchand, and to have formerly borne an inscription recording his taking possession of the island.

Stewart, op.

Bennett, op.

ètres au-dessus du sol, une estrade sur laquelle est déposé le toui-papao. C'est le nom que les naturels donnent au cadavre enveloppé d'herbes

Bennett, op.

Bennett, op.

lle, Typee,

ille, Type

Missionary Voyage to the So

ille, Type

er, op. ci

nstern, op.

dorff, op.

ille, Type

vel, op.

G--, op. cit

nstern, op.

as G--, op.

; Melville, Typee, p. 185. Comp

et, op. cit.

238 note, 239, 269, 270; Vincendon-Dumoulin et C. Desgra

er, op. ci

ured wood, handsomely carved, and adorned in many places with variegated bindings of stained sinnate [cinnet], into which were ingeniously wrought a number of sparkling sea-shells, and a belt of the same shells ran all round it. The body of

guet, op.

moulin et C. Desgr

nstern, op.

, Voyage round the

as G--, op.

Annales de la Propagation de la

R. P. Amable,

R. P. Amable, op

R. P. Amable,

ansky, op.

et, op. cit.

as G--, op.

as G--, op.

et, op. cit.

et, op. cit.

es Vergnes, op.

sler, op.

er, op. cit.

et, op. cit.

1; compare G. Forster, Voyage round

1791, and 1792 by étienne Marchand (London, 1801), i. 31, 51. Marchand's brief acco

i. 108 sq., 133 sqq.; U. Lisiansky, Voyage round the World (London, 1814), pp. 62, 95; G. H. von Langsdorf

cit. i. 77, 83-85. As to the subsequent history of Roberts and Cabri, see Vincend

cific Ocean in the United States frigate Essex in the years 18

ter, op. cit

Islands." Mr. Crook first landed in the island of Santa Christina (Tau-ata) on June 6th, 1797. See James Wilson, Missionary Voyage to the Southern Pacific O

ing Voyage round the Globe from the year

ars in habitual intercourse with the natives (p. 49), and from other allusions which he makes in his narrative (pp. 28 sq.) it would seem that the years were 1839 and 1840. The first Ca

ypee (London, Everym

ulin et C. Desgraz,

C. Desgraz, Iles Marquises

ole Sud et dans l'Océanie, Histoire du

édition (Paris, 1882). The author does not inform

guet, op. cit

ergnes, L'Archipel des Il

esas, which are said to contain some useful information on the archipelago. See M. Radiguet, op. cit. p. 310 note. I have not seen the work of M. Jouan; but according to Radiguet it shows tha

s, par M. le Docteur

l, op. cit.

pp. 189-242. The writer omits to mention the date of his