However great the attachment between the deceased and the survivors might have been, and however they might desire to prolong the melancholy satisfaction resulting from the presence of the lifeless body, on which they still felt it some alleviation to gaze, the heat of the climate was such, as to require that it should be speedily removed, unless methods were employed for its preservation, and these were generally too expensive for the poor and middle ranks. They were therefore usually obliged to inter the corpse sometimes on the first, and seldom later than the second day after death. During the short period that they could indulge the painful sympathies connected with the retention of the body, it was placed on a sort of bier covered with the best white native cloth they possessed, and decorated with wreaths and garlands of the most odoriferous flowers. The body was also placed on a kind of bed of green fragrant leaves, which were also strewed over the floor of the dwelling. During the period which elapsed between the death and interment of the body, the relatives and surviving friends sat round the corpse, indulging in melancholy sadness, giving vent to their grief in loud and continued lamentations, often accompanied with the use of the shark's tooth; which they employed in cutting their temples, faces, and breasts, till they were covered with blood from their self-inflicted wounds. The bodies were frequently committed to the grave in deep silence, unbroken excepting by occasional lamentations of those who attended. But on some occasions, the father delivered an affecting and pathetic oration at the funeral of his son. The bodies of the dead, among the chiefs, were, however, in general preserved above ground: a temporary house or shed was erected for them, and they were placed on a kind of bier. The practice of embalming appears to have been long familiar to them; and the length of time which the body was thus preserved, depended altogether upon the costliness and care with which the process was performed. The methods employed were at all times remarkably simple: sometimes the moisture of the body was removed by pressing the different parts, drying it in the sun, and anointing it with fragrant oils. At other times, the intestines, brain, &c. were removed; all moisture was extracted from the body, which was fixed in a sitting position during the day, and exposed to the sun, and, when placed horizontally, at night was frequently turned over, that it might not remain long on the same side. The inside was then filled with cloth saturated with perfumed oils, which were also injected into other parts of the body, and carefully rubbed over the outside every day. This, together with the heat of the sun, and the dryness of the atmosphere, favored the preservation of the body. Under the influence of these causes, in the course of a few weeks the muscles dried up, and the whole body appeared as if covered with a kind of parchment. It was then clothed, and fixed in a sitting posture; a small altar was erected before it, and offerings of fruit, food, and flowers, were daily presented by the relatives, or the priest appointed to attend the body. In this state it was preserved many months, and when it decayed, the skull was carefully kept by the family, while the other bones, &c. were buried within the precincts of the family temple. The houses erected as depositories for the dead, were small and temporary buildings, though often remarkably neat. The pillars supporting the roof were planted in the ground, and were seldom more than six feet high. The bier or platform on which the body was laid, was about three feet from the ground, and was moveable, for the purpose of being drawn out, and of exposing the body to the rays of the sun. The corpse was usually clothed, except when visited by the relatives or friends of the deceased. It was, however, for a long time carefully rubbed with aromatic oils once a day. A light kind of altar was erected near it, on which articles of food, fruits, and garlands of flowers were daily deposited; and if the deceased were a chief of rank or fame, a priest or other person was appointed to attend the corpse, and present food to its mouth at different periods during the day. The Sandwich islanders observe a number of singular ceremonies on the death of their kings and chiefs, and have been, till very recently, accustomed to make these events occasions for the practice of almost every enormity and vice. The custom we noticed at this place is the most general. The people here had followed only one fashion in cutting their hair, but we have seen it polled in every imaginable form; sometimes a small round place only is made bald, just on the crown, which causes them to look like Romish priests; at other times the whole head is shaved or cropped close, except round the edge, where, for about half an inch in breadth, the hair hangs down its usual length. Some make their heads bald on one side, and leave the hair twelve or eighteen inches long on the other. Occasionally they cut out a patch, in the shape of a horseshoe, either behind, or above the forehead; and sometimes we have seen a number of curved furrows cut from ear to ear, or from the forehead to the neck. When a chief who had lost a relative or friend had his own hair cut after any particular pattern, his followers and dependants usually imitated it in cutting theirs. Not to cut or shave off the hair, indicates want of respect towards the deceased and the surviving friends; but to have it cut close, in any form, is enough. Each one usually follows his own peculiar taste, which produces the almost endless variety in which this ornamental appendage of the head is worn by the natives during a season of mourning. Another custom, almost as universal on these occasions, was that of knocking out some of the front teeth, practised by both sexes, though perhaps most extensively by the men. When a chief died, those most anxious to show their respect for him or his family would be the first to knock out, with a stone, one of their front teeth. The chiefs related to the deceased, or on terms of friendship with him, were expected thus to exhibit their attachment; and when they had done so, their attendants and tenants felt themselves, by the influence of custom, obliged to follow their example. Sometimes a man broke out his own tooth with a stone; more frequently, however, it was done by another, who fixed one end of a piece of stick or hard wood against the tooth, and struck the other end with a stone, till it was broken off. When any of the men deferred this operation, the women often performed it for them, while they were asleep. More than one tooth was seldom destroyed at one time; but the mutilation being repeated on the decease of every chief of rank or authority, there are few men to be seen, who had arrived at maturity before the introduction of Christianity to the islands, with an entire set of teeth; and many, by this custom, have lost the front teeth on both the upper and lower jaw, which, aside from other inconveniences, causes a great defect in their speech. Some, however, have dared to be singular; and though they must have seen many deaths, have parted with but few of their teeth. Among this number is Karaimoku, a chief next in authority to the king; not more than one of whose teeth are deficient. Cutting one or both ears was formerly practised on these occasions; but as we never saw more than one or two old men thus disfigured, the custom appears to have been discontinued. Another badge of mourning, assumed principally by the chiefs, is that of tatauing a black spot or line on the tongue, in the same manner as other parts of their bodies are tataued. All these usages, though singular, are innocent, compared with others, which, until very recently, were practised on every similar event. As soon as the chief had expired, the whole neighborhood exhibited a scene of confusion, wickedness, and cruelty, seldom witnessed even in the most barbarous society. The people ran to and fro without their clothes, appearing and acting more like demons than human beings; every vice was practised, and almost every species of crime perpetrated. Houses were burnt, property plundered, even murder sometimes committed, and the gratification of every base and savage feeling sought without restraint. Injuries or accidents, long forgotten perhaps by the offending party, were now revenged with unrelenting cruelty. Hence many of the people of Maui, dreading their recurrence, when Keopuolani was thought to be near her end, took their effects into the inclosure belonging to the missionaries there, and requested permission to remain there, hoping to find a sanctuary within their premises, amidst the general devastation which they expected would follow her decease. The inhabitants of several groups in the Pacific have mourning ceremonies somewhat resembling these. The Friendly islanders cut off a joint of one of their fingers at the death of a chief, and, like the Society islanders, cut their temples, face, and bosoms, with shark's teeth. The latter also, during their otohaa, or mourning, commit almost as many depredations as the Sandwich islanders. They have, however, one very delicate method of preserving the recollection of the dead, which the lat ter do not appear to employ; that is, of having a small portion of the hair of the deceased passed through a perforation in one of their ears, ingeniously braided in the form of an ear-ring, and worn sometimes for life. But the Sandwich islanders have another custom, almost peculiar to themselves, viz. singing at the death of their chiefs, something in the manner of the ancient Peruvians. I have been peculiarly affected more than once on witnessing this ceremony. A day or two after the decease of Keeaumoku, governor of Maui, and the elder brother of Kuakini, governor of Hawaii, I was sitting with the surviving relatives, who were weeping around the couch on which the corpse was lying, when a middle-aged woman came in at the other end of the large house, and, having proceeded about half way towards the spot where the body lay, began to sing in a plaintive tone, accompanying her song with affecting gesticulations, such as wringing her hands, grasping her hair, and beating her breasts. I wrote down her monody as she repeated it. She described, in a feeling manner, the benevolence of the deceased, and her own consequent loss. One passage was as follows: Ue, ue, ua mate tuu Arii, Tuu hoa i ta anu o ta mouna, Tuu hoa i ta marie, Alas, alas, dead is my chief, My friend in the rain and the wind, My friend in the calm, MEXICANS.-Religion among the Mexicans was formed into a regular system, with its complete train of priests, temples, victims, and festivals. From the genius of the Mexican religion we may form a just conclusion with respect to its influence upon the character of the people. The aspect of superstition in Mexico was gloomy and atrocious. The divinities were clothed with terror, and delighted in vengeance. The figures of serpents, tigers, and other destructive animals, decorated their temples. Fear was the only principle that inspired their votaries. Fasts, mortifications, and penance, all rigid, and many of them excruciating to an extreme degree, were the means employed to appease the wrath of their gods, and the Mexicans never approached their altars without sprinkling them with the blood drawn from their own bodies. But of all offerings, human sacrifices were deemed the most acceptable. As their religious belief was blended with the implacable spirit of vengeance, and added new force to it, every captive taken in war was brought to the temple, devoted as a victim to the deity, and sacrificed with rites no less solemn than cruel. The heart and head were the portion of the gods; while the body was resigned to the captor, who, with his friends, feasted upon it. Under the impression, thus produced, the spirit of the Mexicans was unfeeling, and the genius of their religion counterbalancing the influence of policy and arts, their manners, instead of being softened, became more fierce. Although the Mexicans had some confused idea of a supreme, independent being, to whom fear and adoration were due, they represented him under no external form, because they believed him * A figurative term for the channels between the different islands of the group. to be invisible, and they named by the common appellation of God, in their language denominated "Teotl;" and they applied to him certain epithets expressive of grandeur and power. They called him "Ipalnemoani," i. e. he by whom we live, and "Tloque Nahuàque," .ie he who has all in himself. But their principal worship seems to have been directed to an evil spirit, the enemy of all mankind, called "Tlacatecolototl," or, rational Owl, and they said that he often appears to men for the purpose of terrifying them or doing them an injury. They considered the human soul as immortal, allowing immortality also to the souls of brutes. They believed in a kind of transmigration, and thought that the souls of soldiers who died in battle, or in captivity among their enemies, and those of women who died in labor, went to the house of the sun to lead a life of delight; but they supposed that after four years of this glorious life, they animated birds of beautiful feathers and of sweet song, with liberty to rise again to heaven, or to descend upon the earth. The souls of inferior persons were supposed to pass into weazels, beetles, and such other meaner animals. The souls of those that were drowned, or struck by lightning, of those who died by dropsy or other diseases, went, along with the souls of children, to a cool and delightful place, the residence of "Tlalocan," where they enjoyed the most delicious repasts. The abode of those who suffered any other kind of death was the “Mictlan," or hell, which they conceived to be a place of utter darkness. The Mexicans are said to have had a clear tradition, somewhat corrupted by fable, of the creation of the world, of the universal deluge, of the confusion of tongues, and of the dispersion of the people; and these events were actually represented in their pictures. Among all the deities worshipped by the Mexicans, which were very numerous, there were thirteen principal or greater gods, in honor of whom they consecrated that number. The greatest god, after the invisible god or supreme being, was "Tezcatlipoza," the god of providence, the god of the world, the creator of heaven and earth, and the maker of all things. He was always young, so that no length of years diminished his power, and to him it belonged to confer benefits on the just, and to punish the wicked with diseases and other afflictions. Among their greater gods were also the sun and moon, the god of the air, "Tlaloc," the god of water, to whom they ascribed the fertility of the earth and the protection of their temporal goods; to him they consecrated a temple, and in honor of him celebrated festivals every year; the god of fire, who was greatly revered in the Mexican empire; "Centeotl," or goddess of the earth and of corn, who had five temples in Mexico and three annual festivals; the god of hell, and his female companion, much honored by the Mexicans; the god of night, to whom they recommended their children, that they might sleep; and "Mexitli," the god of war, most honored by the Mexi cans and regarded as their chief protector. There were other gods of commerce, fishing, hunting, &c. They had also two hundred and sixty gods, to whom they consecrated as many days. The number of images by which the gods were represented and worshipped in the temples, the houses, the streets, and the woods, were almost infinite. These images |