The Samoan sent down his daughter Toli in the shape of a snipe to survey the world below. As she saw nothing but sea, her father rolled down a stone, which became one island, and another which became a second, and so on. The first growth of such islands was wild vine. They were pulled out of the ground and heaped up to rot, so that worms were produced. Out of these worms grew men and women. Oro, the god of war, was the mighty protector of Tahiti. His father, Taaroa, was the son of night, for here also, as among the Greeks, all originally proceeded from darkness. Hiro, the Polynesian Neptune, likewise played a considerable part in legendary lore. Once the monsters of the deep had lulled him with a profound sleep while the god of winds raised a terrible storm to destroy a vessel in which his friends were embarked. Their destruction seemed inevitable, but a good spirit penetrated into the sea-grot where the god was dozing, awoke him from his slumbers, and told him of the danger his followers were in. Instantly he rose to the surface, where his presence scared away the weaker storm-god, and his friends were saved. In the Sandwich Islands, the chief divinities resided in the burning craters of Mauna Loa, for no phenomenon of nature was equal in terrific grandeur to these explosions of subterranean fire, and the mysterious powers which caused them were necessarily prominent in power. There dwelt Pele the supreme goddess of fire, with a whole train of subordinate deities, such as Kamoho ‘the king of steam,’ Teoahitamatana ‘the fire-spitting son of war,’ Hiatawawahilani ‘the sky-rending cloud-compeller.’ The roar of the volcano was the music to which their deities danced, their delight was to swim in the waves of the fiery sea. Never did these dreadful beings leave their abodes for a beneficial purpose, but only to receive offerings or to wreak vengeance: the quaking of the earth, the outpouring lava stream announced their coming. This religion of dread placed of course an enormous power in the hands of the priests, who profited largely by the terrors of a credulous people. As in Greece, the divinities of the Polynesian Pantheon were worshipped under the palpable form of idols in large temples, or inclosures; but while Apollo or Jove fashioned by the hand of a Phidias or Scopas still command the admiration of a world which has long since ceased to believe in them, the rude figures which the Tahitian or the Hawaiian adored were models of hideous deformity. Like the ancient Greeks, the Polynesians had also their Elysium. The higher gods, and the souls of kings, chiefs and councillors, resided in a happy island, more beautiful than any on earth; but the common people were excluded from this abode of felicity, as they have been debarred from all political rights in life. The idea of a retributive justice had no room in the Polynesian mind, and birth claimed its privileges even after death, while merit was ignored.