he would soon sleep. Then he would kill him. Maui
waited. One eye was closed, seven eyes were opened. Then four eyes
closed, leaving three. The night was almost past and dawn was near. Then
Maui called to Hina with his spirit voice, "O Hina, keep it dark." Hina
made the gray dawn dark in the three eyes and two closed in sleep. The
last eye was weary, and it also slept. Then Maui went out of the bird
body and cut off the head of Pea-pea and put it inside the bird. He
broke the roof of the house until a large opening was made. He took his
wife, Kumu-lama, and flew away to the island of Oahu. The winds blew
hard against the flying bird. Rain fell in torrents around it, but those
inside had no trouble.

"Thus Maui returned with his wife to his home in Oahu. The story is pau
(finished)."

XI.

MAUI SEEKING IMMORTALITY.

Climb up, climb up,
To the highest surface of heaven,
To all the sides of heaven.

Climb then to thy ancestor,
The sacred bird in the sky,
To thy ancestor Rehua
In the heavens.

--New Zealand kite incantation.

The story of Maui seeking immortality for the human race is one of the
finest myths in the world. For pure imagination and pathos it is
difficult to find any tale from Grecian or Latin literature to compare
with it. In Greek and Roman fables gods suffered for other gods, and yet
none were surrounded with such absolutely mythical experiences as those
through which the demi-god Maui of the Pacific Ocean passed when he
entered the gates of death with the hope of winning immortality for
mankind. The really remarkable group of legends which cluster around
Maui is well concluded by the story of his unselfish and heroic battle
with death.

The different islands of the Pacific have their Hades, or abode of dead.
It is, with very few exceptions, down in the interior of the earth.
Sometimes the tunnels left by currents of melted lava are the passages
into the home of departed spirits. In Samoa there are two circular holes
among the rocks at the west end of the island Savaii. These are the
entrances to the under-world for chiefs and people. The spirits of those
who die on the other islands leap into the sea and swim around the land
from island to island until they reach Savaii. Then they plunge down
into their heaven or their hades.

The Tongans had a spirit island for the home of the dead. They said that
some natives once sailed far away in a canoe and found this island