real part of man; for
the word _loto_, though it might sometimes be used for that purpose, yet
rather means a man's disposition, inclination, passion, or sentiment.
The soul was supposed to exist throughout the whole of the body, but to
be particularly present in the heart, the pulsation of which they
regarded as the strength and power of the soul. They did not clearly
distinguish between the life and the soul, but said that the right
auricle of the heart was the seat of life. They took the liver to be the
seat of courage, and professed to have remarked, on opening dead bodies,
that the largest livers belonged to the bravest men, in which
observation they were careful to make allowance for the enlargement of
livers consequent on disease.[91]

[91] W. Mariner, _Tonga Islands_, ii. 127 _sq._

They acknowledged that the _tooas_ or lower order of people had minds or
souls; but they firmly believed that these vulgar souls died with their
bodies and consequently had no future existence. In this aristocratic
opinion the generality of the commoners acquiesced, though some were
vain enough to think that they had souls like their betters, and that
they would live hereafter in Bolotoo. But the orthodox Tongan doctrine
restricted immortality to chiefs and their ministers (the _matabooles_);
at most, by a stretch of charity, it extended the privilege to the
_mooas_ or third estate; but it held out no hope of salvation to
_tooas_, who formed the fourth and lowest rank of society.[92]

[92] W. Mariner, _op. cit._ i. 419, ii. 99, 128 _sq._

Mariner's account, which I have followed, of the sharp distinction which
the Tongans drew between the immortality of chiefs and the mortality of
common people is confirmed by the testimony of other and independent
observers. According to Captain Cook, while the souls of the chiefs went
immediately after death to the island of Boolootoo (Bolotoo), the souls
of the lower sort of people underwent a sort of transmigration or were
eaten by a bird called _loata_, which walked upon their graves for that
purpose.[93] The first missionaries, who landed in Tongataboo in 1797,
report that the natives "believe the immortality of the soul, which at
death, they say, is immediately conveyed in a very large fast-sailing
canoe to a distant country called Doobludha, which they describe as
resembling the Mahometan paradise. They call the god of this region of
pleasure Higgolayo, and esteem him as the greate