e a scene I chanced
to witness at Nukuheva.

A young man had died, about daybreak, in a house near the beach. I had
been sent ashore that morning, and saw a good deal of the preparations
they were making for his obsequies. The body, neatly wrapped in a new
white tappa, was laid out in an open shed of cocoanut boughs, upon a
bier constructed of elastic bamboos ingeniously twisted together. This
was supported about two feet from the ground, by large canes planted
uprightly in the earth. Two females, of a dejected appearance, watched
by its side, plaintively chanting and beating the air with large grass
fans whitened with pipe-clay. In the dwelling-house adjoining a numerous
company we assembled, and various articles of food were being prepared
for consumption. Two or three individuals, distinguished by head-dresses
of beautiful tappa, and wearing a great number of ornaments, appeared
to officiate as masters of the ceremonies. By noon the entertainment had
fairly begun and we were told that it would last during the whole of
the two following days. With the exception of those who mourned by
the corpse, every one seemed disposed to drown the sense of the late
bereavement in convivial indulgence. The girls, decked out in their
savage finery, danced; the old men chanted; the warriors smoked and
chatted; and the young and lusty, of both sexes, feasted plentifully,
and seemed to enjoy themselves as pleasantly as they could have done had
it been a wedding.

The islanders understand the art of embalming, and practise it with such
success that the bodies of their great chiefs are frequently preserved
for many years in the very houses where they died. I saw three of these
in my visit to the Bay of Tior. One was enveloped in immense folds of
tappa, with only the face exposed, and hung erect against the side of
the dwelling. The others were stretched out upon biers of bamboo, in
open, elevated temples, which seemed consecrated to their memory. The
heads of enemies killed in battle are invariably preserved and hung up
as trophies in the house of the conqueror. I am not acquainted with the
process which is in use, but believe that fumigation is the principal
agency employed. All the remains which I saw presented the appearance of
a ham after being suspended for some time in a smoky chimney.

But to return from the dead to the living. The late festival had drawn
together, as I had every reason to believe, the whole population of the
v