{34} Note 13, page 34. “_Fish_, _the food of desire_.” There is a special word in the Tahitian language to signify _hungering after fish_. I may remark that here is one of my chief difficulties about the whole story. How did king, commons, women, and all come to eat together at this feast? But it troubled none of my numerous authorities; so there must certainly be some natural explanation. {41} Note 14, page 41. “_The mustering word of the clan_.” _Teva te ua_, _Teva te matai_! Teva the wind, Teva the rain! {51a} Note 15, page 51. “_The star of the dead_.” Venus as a morning star. I have collected much curious evidence as to this belief. The dead retain their taste for a fish diet, enter into copartnery with living fishers, and haunt the reef and the lagoon. The conclusion attributed to the nameless lady of the legend would be reached to-day, under the like circumstances, by ninety per cent of Polynesians: and here I probably understate by one-tenth. {51b} Note 16, page 51. See note 15 above. THE FEAST OF FAMINE MARQUESAN MANNERS I. THE PRIEST’S VIGIL IN all the land of the tribe was neither fish nor fruit, And the deepest pit of popoi stood empty to the foot. {61} The clans upon the left and the clans upon the right Now oiled their carven maces and scoured their daggers bright; They gat them to the thicket, to the deepest of the shade, And lay with sleepless eyes in the deadly ambuscade. And oft in the starry even the song of morning rose, What time the oven smoked in the country of their foes; For oft to loving hearts, and waiting ears and sight, The lads that went to forage returned not with the night. Now first the children sickened, and then the women paled, And the great arms of the warrior no more for war availed. Hushed was the deep drum, discarded was the dance; And those that met the priest now glanced at him askance. The priest was a man of years, his eyes were ruby-red, {62a} He neither feared the dark nor the terrors of the dead, He knew the songs of races, the names of ancient date; And the beard upon his bosom would have bought the chief’s estate. He dwelt in a high-built lodge, hard by the roaring shore, Raised on a noble terrace and with tikis {62b} at the door. Within it was full of riches, for he served his nation well, And full of the sound of breakers, like the hollow of a shell. For weeks he let them perish, gave never a helping sign, But sat on his oiled platform to commune with the divine, But sat on his high terrace, with the tikis by his side, And stared on the blue ocean, like a parrot, ruby-eyed. Dawn as yellow as sulphur leaped on the mountain height: Out on the round of the sea the gems of the morning light, Up from the round of the sea the streamers of the sun;— But down in the depths of the valley the day was not begun. In the blue of the woody twilight burned red the cocoa-husk,