Among the _Maoris_ or aborigines of _New Zealand_ cannibalism prevailed to an alarming extent, also among the natives of the Sandwich Islands, Tahiti, and neighboring groups. Ellis in his “Polynesian Researches” shows that the Polynesians evinced a strong disposition to devour the flesh and drink the blood of their slain enemies; and the motive which governed them seemed to be the arousing of terror and obtaining a satisfactory revenge. A New Zealand warrior having killed his foe, would sever the head from the body, scoop up the warm life-blood flowing from the mutilated trunk, and facing his enemies with fiendish triumph would drink it in presence of other captors. Perhaps if there is one feature in the history of these islanders better known than another, it is the reputation they had of preferring the human subject as an article of diet to any inferior mammalia. In song and story this omnivorous weakness of the “King of the Cannibal Islands” and his dusky subjects has been celebrated. Dr. Brown of Edinburgh in writing concerning the habits and customs of this people observes with a certain degree of grim humor, “If the Polynesian did eat his brother instead of loving him, he loved him (gastronomically) not only wisely but well; for the custom was conducive of great good, kept down the price of pork, yams and fowls, saved funeral expenses, thinned the population of an insular country, etc.; moreover, was it not in part a religious observance only allowed to certain individuals of high piety and stout digestion, and therefore to be encouraged and praised instead of being condemned in a chorus of seamen’s oaths and missionary hymns?” And yet in face of this and numerous other facts, some positively assert that cannibalism never existed among the islands in the South Pacific. Time has wrought however among these peoples great changes, and when as now some of these pristine savages are seen clothed in the usual attire prevalent in the western world, it is very humiliating to be asked whether their respected fathers perhaps ever partook of “cold missionary.” It is but just to these distant people, however, to say that never was cannibalism rampant among them, as was true of the occupants of the neighboring isles; and it is equally pleasant to know that, ornaments of the human person, either as charms or necklaces, made of human teeth, have lost their former popularity.