onsisted in a great measure of nature worship.
To their minds all the powers of nature, especially those that are
mysterious and terrible, were conceived of as living and spiritual
beings. Thus the volcano, the thunder, the whirlwind, the meteor and the
shark were feared as being either the embodiment or the work of
malevolent spirits (_akuas_).

The four great gods, Kane, Kanaloa, Ku and Lono, who were worshiped
throughout Polynesia, originally belonged to this class, as is shown by
the cosmogony of the New Zealand Maoris. Among these four Kane held the
primacy. The souls of great chiefs went to his abode after death.

Pele, the dread goddess of volcanoes, and her numerous family, dwelt in
the crater of Kilauea, but also caused the eruptions of Mauna Loa and
Hualalai. In Hawaii she was feared more than any other deity.

One large class of _akuas_ were supposed to be incarnated in certain
species of animals, which were feared or believed to have a supernatural
character, as the shark.

Another class of deities, which included most of the professional gods,
consisted of deified spirits of the dead. The _Aumakuas_ were tutelar
deities, attached to particular families, who were often deified
ancestors. Sickness and disease were generally caused by their
displeasure.

CEREMONIAL SYSTEM.

There were two hereditary orders of priests, endowed with lands, who
kept up the elaborate liturgy and ritual of the temples, and also
preserved whatever knowledge of astronomy, history, medicine, etc., had
been handed down to them.

The tabu system covered the entire daily life of the people with a vast
network of minute regulations and penalties. Thus, it was tabu for men
and women to eat together, or even to have their food cooked in the same
oven. Women were forbidden to eat pork, bananas, cocoanuts, or turtle
and certain kinds of fish, on pain of death. There were certain tabu
days when no canoe could be launched, no fire lighted, and when no sound
could be made, on pain of death. Even dogs had to be muzzled and fowls
shut up in calabashes for twenty-four hours at a time.

The human sacrifice was the crowning act of the ancient worship, offered
only on certain solemn occasions, and at the temples (_Heiaus_) of the
highest class.

Whenever a temple was to be dedicated, a new house to be built for the
chief, or a new war canoe to be launched, many of the people fled to the
mountains and lay hidden till the danger was past.