The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead Volume Ii Part 24

Among the caverns in which, in the island of Mangaia, the dead used to be deposited, two are particularly famous. One of them, at Tamarua, is the chasm called Raupa or "leafy entrance" on account of the dense growth of hibiscus which formerly surrounded this supposed entrance to the shades. It was the ancient burial-place of the Tongan tribe, the descendants of a band of Tongans, who had landed in Mangaia and settled there. The chasm is a hundred and fifty feet deep and has two openings, the smaller of which was used only for chiefs and priests. The other famous sepulchral cavern, called Auraka, is situated on the western side of the island. It was the grand depository of the dead of the ruling families, who claimed to be descended from the great G.o.d Rongo. This chasm is not nearly so deep as Raupa, but, like it, has two entrances; the one sacred and the other profane; the former was reserved for the bodies of the n.o.bility, the latter for the bodies of commoners. Besides these ceremonial entrances there are many natural openings into the vast subterranean cave, for the rock is everywhere perforated. It is possible by torchlight to explore the gloomy recesses of the cavern, which in some places contracts to the narrowest dimensions, while in others it expands till the roof is almost lost to sight. Hundreds of well-preserved mummies may be seen lying in rows, some on ledges of stalact.i.te, others on wooden platforms. Mr. Gill, who thrice visited the cave, judged that some of the bodies were over fifty years old. The whole neighbourhood of the great cavern was deemed sacred to wandering disembodied spirits, who were believed to come up at midnight and exhibit the ghastly wounds by which they had met their fate.[59]

[59] W. W. Gill, _Life in the Southern Isles_, pp. 71 _sq._ As to the settlement of a Tongan colony in Mangaia, see _id._, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp. 287 _sq._ In native tradition the colonists were spoken of as "Tongans sailing through the skies" (_Tongaiti-akareva-moana_). Their leader was the first high-priest of the G.o.d Turanga.

-- 7. _The Fate of the Human Soul after Death_

The home of the departed spirits was believed to be a vast subterranean region called Avaiki. The natives of Mangaia believed that this mysterious region was situated directly under their island. "As the dead were usually thrown down the deepest chasms, it was not unnatural for their friends to imagine the earth to be hollow, and the entrance to this vast nether world to be down one of these pits. No one can wonder at this who knows that the outer portion of Mangaia is a honeycomb, the rock being pierced in every direction with winding caves and frightful chasms. It is a.s.serted that the Mission premises at Oneroa are built over one of these great caverns, which extends so far towards the sea that the beating of the surf can be distinctly heard, whilst the water, purified from its saline particles, continually drips from the stony roof." The inland opening into the infernal regions was believed to be the great cavern of Auraka, in which, as we have just seen, so many of the dead were deposited.[60]

[60] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp.

152-154.

However, Avaiki was not the home of the ghosts alone; it was tenanted also by the G.o.ds, both the greater and the lesser, with their dependants. There they married, and multiplied, and quarrelled, just like mortals. There they planted, cooked, fished, and inhabited dwellings of exactly the same sort as exist on earth. Their food was no better than that of mortals. There might be seen birds, fish, and rats, likewise the mantis, centipedes, and beetles. There the coco-nut palm, the panda.n.u.s, and the myrtle flourished, and yams grew in abundance. The G.o.ds committed murder and adultery; they got drunk; they lied; they stole. The arts and crafts were also practised by the deities, who indeed taught them to mankind. The visible world, in short, was but a gross copy of the spiritual and invisible world. If fire burns, it is because latent flame was hidden in wood by the G.o.d Mauike in Hades. If the axe cleaves, it is because the fairy of the axe is present unseen in the blade. If the ironwood club kills its man, it is because a fierce demon from Tonga lives in the weapon.[61]

[61] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, p.

154.

The old high-road to the spirit-land used to start from a place called Aremauku, on a cliff overhanging the western ocean. By this road a regular communication was formerly kept up with the infernal regions. It was by this route, for example, that the hero Maui descended in ancient days to the home of the fire-G.o.d Mauike and brought up fire for the use of men. However, the denizens of spirit-land in time grew very troublesome by constantly coming up and afflicting mankind with disease and death; they also created a dearth by stealing people's food, and they even ravished their wives. To put an end to these perpetual annoyances a brave and beautiful woman, Tiki by name, rolled herself alive down into the gloomy chasm which led to the infernal world. The yawning abyss closed on her, and there has been no thoroughfare ever since. The spirits have not been able to come up from Avaiki by that road, and the souls of the dead have been equally unable to go down by it; they are now obliged to descend by a different route.[62]

[62] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp.

154 _sq._

After their departure from the body the spirits of the dead wandered disconsolately along the seash.o.r.e, picking their steps painfully among the sharp spikes of the coral and stumbling over the bindweed and thick vines which caught their feet. The fragrant smell of the heliotrope, which grows luxuriantly among these barren and rugged rocks, afforded them a little relief, and they wore a red creeper, like a turban, round their heads; the rest of their costume was a miscellaneous collection of weeds which they had picked up in the course of their wanderings. Twice a year, at the summer and winter solstices, they mustered to follow the setting sun down into the under world. They gathered at the two points of the island which face towards the rising of the sun at these two seasons of the year. At the summer solstice, in January, he seems to rise out of the sea opposite to Ana-Kura, that is, the Red Cave, so called because it receives the red rays of the morning. It was there that by far the greater number of the ghosts gathered for their last sad journey with the sun: they all belonged to the southern half of the island. The other point of ghostly muster was called Karanga-iti or "the Little Welcome"; it faced towards the rising of the sun at the winter solstice in June, and it was there that the ghosts born in the northern half of the island a.s.sembled. Thus many months might elapse between a death and the final departure of the soul from the land of the living.

The weary interval was spent by the spirits in dancing and revisiting their old homes. As a rule they were well disposed to their living relatives, but the ghost of a mother would often grow vindictive when she saw her pet child ill-treated by its stepmother. Sometimes, weary of wandering, the poor ghosts huddled together in the Red Cave, waiting for the midsummer sun and listening to the monotonous moan of the great rollers, which break there eternally.[63]

[63] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp.

155-157.

The exact moment of departure was fixed by the leader of the band. As the time drew near, messengers were despatched to call in the stray ghosts who might be lingering near their ancient haunts. Tearfully they gathered at the Red Cave or on a gra.s.sy lawn above it, out of reach of the foam and the billows. All kept their eyes on the spot of the horizon where the sun was expected to appear. At the first streak of dawn the whole band took their departure to meet the rising orb of day. That done, they followed in his train as nearly as might be, flitting behind or beneath him across the rolling waters or the rocks and stones of the coast, till towards the close of day they all mustered at Vairo-rongo, "the Sacred Stream of Rongo," facing towards the setting sun. The spot is so named from a little rivulet which there rushes out of the stones at the sacred grove (_marae_) of Rongo: none but priests and kings might bathe there in days of old. At the moment when the sun sank beneath the horizon, the entire band of ghosts followed him along the golden track of light across the s.h.i.+mmering sea and descended in his train to the nether world, but not like him to reappear on the morrow.[64]

[64] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp.

157 _sq._

There were three such points of departure for the spirit-land in Mangaia, all facing the setting sun. Each of them was known as a _Reinga vaerua_ or "leaping-place of souls." One of them was at Oneroa, where a rocky bluff stands out by itself like a giant looking towards the west. To it a band of souls from the great cavern of Auraka used to go in mournful procession, and from it they leaped one by one to a second and much smaller block of stone resting on the inner edge of the reef; thence they pa.s.sed to the outer brink of the reef, on which the surf beats ceaselessly, and from which at sunset they flitted over the ocean to sink with the great luminary into the land of the dead.

Such appears to have been the general notion of the people concerning the departure of human souls at death in Mangaia. Similar ideas prevailed in the other islands of the group, in all of which the "leaping-place of souls" was regularly situated on the western coast of the island.[65]

[65] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp.

159 _sq._

The teaching of the priests added many particulars to this general account of the journey of the soul to the nether world. According to them the souls of the dying, before life was quite extinct, left their bodies and travelled towards the edge of the cliff at Araia, near the sacred grove (_marae_) of Rongo, which faced westward. But if on its way to this fatal bourne the soul of the dying chanced to meet a friendly spirit who cried to it, "Go back and live," the departing soul would joyfully return to its forsaken body, and the sick man or woman would revive. This was the native explanation of fainting. But if no friendly spirit intervened to save the pa.s.sing soul, it pursued its way to the edge of the cliff. On its arrival a great wave of the sea washed the base of the crag, and a gigantic _bua_ tree (_Beslaria laurifolia_), covered with fragrant blossoms, sprang up from Avaiki to receive the ghost. The tree had as many branches as there were princ.i.p.al G.o.ds in Mangaia, and every ghost had to perch on the particular branch allotted to members of his or her tribe; the wors.h.i.+ppers of the great G.o.ds, such as Motoro and Tane, had separate boughs provided for their accommodation; while the wors.h.i.+ppers of the lesser deities huddled together on a single big branch.[66]

[66] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp.

160 _sq._; _id._, "Mangaia (Hervey Islands)," _op. cit._ p. 346.

No sooner had the ghost perched on the place appointed for him than down plumped the tree with him into the nether world. Looking down to see where he was going, what was the horror of the ghost to perceive a great net spread by Akaanga and his a.s.sistants to catch him at the foot of the tree! Into this fatal net the doomed spirit inevitably fell to sink in a lake of fresh water and there to wriggle like a fish for a time. At last the net was pulled up with the ghost in it, who, half-drowned, was now ushered trembling into the presence of the grim hag Miru, generally known as "the Ruddy," because her face reflected the glowing heat of the ever-burning oven in which she cooked her ghostly victims. At first, however, she fed, and perhaps fattened, them on a diet of black beetles, red earth-worms, crabs, and small blackbirds. Thus refreshed, they had next to drain bowls of strong kava brewed by the fair hands of the hag's four lovely daughters. Reduced to a state of insensibility by the intoxicating beverage, the ghosts were then borne off without a struggle to the oven and cooked. On the substance of these hapless victims Miru and her son and her peerless daughters regularly subsisted. The leavings of the meal were thrown to the servants. Such was the fate of all who died what we should call a natural death, and therefore of all cowards, women, and children. They were annihilated.[67]

[67] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp.

161 _sq._; _id._, "Mangaia (Hervey Islands)," _op. cit._ pp. 346 _sq._

Not so with warriors who fell fighting on the field of battle. For a time, indeed, their souls wandered about among the rocks and trees where their bodies were thrown, the ghastly wounds by which they met their fate being still visible. The plaintive chirping of a certain cricket, rarely seen but heard continually at night, was believed to be the voice of the slain warriors sorrowfully calling to their friends. At last the first who fell would gather his brother ghosts at a place a little beyond Araia, on the edge of the cliff and facing the sunset. There they would linger for a time. But suddenly a mountain sprang up at their feet, and they ascended it over the spears and clubs which had given them their mortal wounds. Arrived at the summit they leaped up into the blue expanse, thus becoming the peculiar clouds of the winter or dry season. During the rainy season they could mount up to the warriors'

paradise in the sky. In June, the first month of winter, the atmosphere was pervaded by these ghosts, to whom the chilliness of death still clung. For days together their thronging shapes hid the sun, dimming the sky and spreading among men the heaviness and oppression of spirits which are characteristic of the season. But with the early days of August, when the coral-tree puts forth its blood-red blossoms and the sky grows mottled with light fleecy clouds, the ghosts of the brave prepare to take flight for heaven. Soon the sky is cloudless, the weather bright and warm. The ghosts have fled away, and the living resume their wonted avocations in quiet and comfort.[68]

[68] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp.

162 _sq._

In their celestial home the spirits of the slain are immortal. There, in memory of their deeds on earth, they dance their old war dances over again, decked with gay flowers--the white gardenia, the yellow _bua_, the golden fruit of the panda.n.u.s, and the dark crimson, bell-like blossom of the native laurel, intertwined with myrtle; and from their blissful heights they look down with pity and disgust on the wretched souls in Avaiki entangled in the fatal net and besmeared with filth. For the spirits of the slain in battle are strong and vigorous, their bodies never having been wasted by disease; whereas the spirits of those who die a natural death are excessively feeble and weak, like their bodies at the moment of dissolution. The natural result of such beliefs was to breed an utter contempt for a violent death, nay even a desire to seek it. Many stories are told of aged warriors, scarcely able to hold a spear, who have insisted on being led to the battlefield in the hope of finding a soldier's death and gaining a soldier's paradise.[69]

[69] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp.

163 _sq._

Beliefs of the same general character concerning the fate of the dead prevailed in other islands of the Hervey Group. Thus in Rarotonga the great meeting-place of the ghosts was at Tuoro, facing the sunset. There at a stately tree, called "the Weeping Laurel," the disembodied spirits used to bewail their hard fate. If no pitying spirit sent him back to life, the ghost had to scramble up a branch of an ancient _bua_ tree which grew on the spot. Should the bough break under his weight, the ghost was precipitated into the net which Muru had spread out for him in a natural circular hollow of the rock. A lively ghost might break the meshes of the net and escape for a while, but pa.s.sing on to the outer edge of the reef, in the hope of traversing the ocean, he inevitably fell into another net artfully concealed by Akaanga. From this second net escape was impossible. The demons drew the captive ghosts out of the nets, and ruthlessly das.h.i.+ng out their brains on the sharp coral they carried off the shattered victims in triumph to devour them in the lower world. Ghosts from Ngatangiia ascended the n.o.ble mountain range which stretches across the island, dipping into the sea at Tuoro.

Inexpressibly weary and sad was this journey over a road which foot of living wight had never trod. The departed spirits of this tribe met at a great iron-wood tree, of which some branches were green and others dead.

The souls that trod on the green branches came back to life; but the souls that crawled on to the dead boughs were at once caught in the net either of Muru or of Akaanga.[70]

[70] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, pp.

169 _sq._; _id._, "Mangaia (Hervey Islands)," _op. cit._ p. 346.

In Rarotonga, as in Mangaia, the lot of warriors who died in battle was much happier than that of the poor wretches who had the misfortune to die quietly in bed or to be otherwise ignominiously snuffed out. The gallant ghosts were said to join Tiki, who in Rarotonga appears to have been a dead warrior, whereas in Mangaia, as we saw, Tiki was a dead woman. In the Rarotongan Hades, which also went by the name of Avaiki, this Tiki sat at the threshold of a very long house built with walls of reeds, and surrounded by shrubs and flowers of fadeless bloom and never-failing perfume. Each ghost on his arrival had to make an offering to the warder Tiki, who, thus propitiated, admitted him to the house.

There, sitting at their ease, eating, drinking, dancing, or sleeping, the brave of past ages dwelt in unwithering beauty and perpetual youth; there they welcomed newcomers, and there they told the story of their heroic exploits on earth and fought their old battles over again. But ghosts who had nothing to give to Tiki were compelled to stay outside in rain and darkness for ever, s.h.i.+vering with cold and hunger, watching with envious eyes the joyous revels of the inmates, and racked with the vain desire of being admitted to share them.[71]

[71] W. W. Gill, _Myths and Songs from the South Pacific_, p.

170; John Williams, _Narrative of Missionary Enterprises in the South Sea Islands_, pp. 476 _sq._

Such beliefs in the survival of the soul after death may have nerved the warrior with fresh courage in battle; but they can have contributed but little to the happiness and consolation of ordinary people, who could apparently look forward to nothing better in the life hereafter than being cooked and eaten by a hideous hag.

CHAPTER V

THE BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY AMONG THE SOCIETY ISLANDERS

-- 1. _The Society Islands_

The Society Islands are a large and scattered archipelago in the South Pacific, situated within 16 and 18 of South lat.i.tude, and between 148 and 155 of West longitude. They lie some three hundred miles from the Hervey or Cook Islands, from which they are separated by the open sea.

The islands form a chain nearly two hundred miles in length, extending from north-west to south-east, and fall into two groups, an eastern and a western, which, on account of the prevailing wind, are known respectively as the Windward and Leeward Islands. The Windward or eastern group includes Eimeo or Moorea in the west, Maitea in the east, and Tahiti, the princ.i.p.al island of the whole archipelago, in the centre. In the Leeward or western group the chief islands are Huahine, Raiatea, Tahaa, and Borabora. The islands appear to have been first discovered by the Spanish navigator Fernandez de Quiros in 1606 or 1607, but after him they were lost sight of till 1767, when they were rediscovered by Wallis. A few years later they were repeatedly visited by Captain Cook, who gave the first full and accurate description of the islands and their inhabitants.[1]

[1] W. Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, i. 6 _sq._; A. v.

H[ugel], "Tahiti," _Encyclopaedia Britannica_, Ninth Edition, xxiii. 22, 24; C. E. Meinicke, _Die Inseln des Stillen Oceans_, ii. 151 _sqq._; F. H. H. Guillemard, _Australasia_, ii. 510. As to Wallis's discovery of the islands see J. Hawkesworth, _Voyages_, i. (London, 1773) pp. 433 _sqq._; R. Kerr, _General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels_, xii. (Edinburgh, 1814) pp. 164 _sqq._

The islands, with the exception of a few flat lagoon islands, are of volcanic formation, high and mountainous, consisting for the most part of a central peak or peaks of bold and striking outline, which descend in steep ridges towards the sea, sometimes reaching the coast, but oftener leaving a broad stretch of flat and very fertile land between their last slopes and the beach. Between the ridges lie deep and beautiful valleys, watered by winding streams and teeming with luxuriant vegetation. The rocks of which the islands consist are all igneous, chiefly trachyte, dolerite, basalt, and lava. They are considered by geologists to present perhaps the most wonderful and instructive example of volcanic rocks to be seen on the globe. Yet, though the islands are judged to be of comparatively recent formation, there are no traces of volcanic action in them at the present time. The craters have disappeared: hot springs do not exist; and earthquakes are rare.[2]

[2] W. Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, i. 11 _sqq._; C. E.

Meinicke, _op. cit._ ii. 152 _sq._; A. v. H[ugel], _op. cit._ p. 22; F. H. H. Guillemard, _op. cit._ p. 513.

The Society Islands, and Tahiti in particular, are famous for the beauty of their natural scenery; indeed, by general consent they appear to rank as the fairest islands in the Pacific. Travellers vie with each other in praise of their enchanting loveliness. Tahiti, the largest island of the group, may be taken as typical of them all. It consists of two almost circular islands united by a very low and narrow neck of land: the northern and larger island is known as Tahiti the Great (Tahiti nui), the southern and smaller island is known as Tahiti the Little (Tahiti iti). In the centre of each island the mountains rise in craggy peaks, sometimes in the shape of pyramids or sugar-loaves, their rocky sides clothed with every variety of verdure, and enlivened here and there by cataracts falling from lofty cliffs, while the sh.o.r.e is washed by the white-crested waves of the Pacific breaking in foam on the coral reefs or das.h.i.+ng in spray on the beach. The scene is especially striking when beheld for the first time from the sea at sunrise on a fine morning.

Then the happy combination of land and water, of precipices and plains, of umbrageous trees drooping their pendent boughs over the sea, and distant mountains shown in sublime outline and richest hues, all blended in the harmony of nature, produces in the beholder sensations of admiration and delight. The inland scenery is of a different character, but not less impressive. There the prospect is occasionally extensive, but more frequently circ.u.mscribed. There is, however, a startling boldness in the towering piles of basalt, often heaped in picturesque confusion near the source or margin of some crystal stream that flows in silence at their base, or plashes purling over the rocks that obstruct its bed; and there is the wildness of romance about the deep and lonely glens, from which the mountains rise like the steep sides of a natural amphitheatre till they seem to support the clouds that rest upon their summits. In the character of the teeming vegetation, too, from the verdant moss that drapes the rocks to the rich foliage of the bread-fruit tree, the luxuriance of the panda.n.u.s, and the waving plumes of the coconut palm, all nurtured by a prolific soil and matured by the genial heat of a tropical climate, there is enough to arrest the attention and to strike the imagination of the wanderer, who, in the unbroken silence that reigns in these pleasing solitudes, may easily fancy himself astray in fairyland and treading enchanted ground.[3]