cret signs to each
other: I saw everything, but could comprehend nothing.

On the whole, I am inclined to believe that the islanders in the Pacific
have no fixed and definite ideas whatever on the subject of religion. I am
persuaded that Kolory himself would be effectually posed were he called
upon to draw up the articles of his faith, and pronounce the creed by
which he hoped to be saved. In truth, the Typees, so far as their actions
evince, submitted to no laws, human or divine--always excepting the thrice
mysterious Taboo. The "independent electors" of the valley were not to be
browbeaten by chiefs, priests, idols, or devils. As for the luckless
idols, they received more hard knocks than supplications. I do not wonder
that some of them looked so grim, and stood so bolt upright, as if fearful
of looking to the right or the left, lest they should give any one
offence. The fact is, they had to carry themselves "_pretty straight_," or
suffer the consequences. Their worshippers were such a precious set of
fickle-minded and irreverent heathens, that there was no telling when they
might topple one of them over, break it to pieces, and making a fire with
it on the very altar itself, fall to roasting the offerings of
bread-fruit, and eat them in spite of its teeth.

In how little reverence these unfortunate deities were held by the
natives, was on one occasion most convincingly proved to me. Walking with
Kory-Kory through the deepest recesses of the groves, I perceived a
curious-looking image about six feet in height, which originally had been
placed upright against a low pi-pi, surmounted by a ruinous bamboo temple,
but having become fatigued and weak in the knees, was now carelessly
leaning against it. The idol was partly concealed by the foliage of a tree
which stood near, and whose leafy boughs drooped over the pile of stones,
as if to protect the rude fane from the decay to which it was rapidly
hastening. The image itself was nothing more than a grotesquely-shaped
log, carved in the likeness of a portly naked man, with the arms clasped
over the head, the jaws thrown wide apart, and its thick shapeless legs
bowed into an arch. It was much decayed. The lower part was overgrown with
a bright silky moss. Thin spears of grass sprouted from the distended
mouth, and fringed the outline of the head and arms. His godship had
literally attained a green old age. All its prominent points were bruised
and battered or entirely rotted