Sometimes the body of a very great chief was placed in a wooden receptacle in the midst of the pah, called the waki-tapu, and there allowed to decay. As might be expected, a most horrible odor is disseminated through the pah during the process of decomposition; but the inhabitants do not seem to trouble themselves, their nostrils not being easily offended. For example, when a whale is thrown ashore, the stench of the huge mass of decomposition is so overpowering that an European cannot endure it. The natives, however, say that they are used to it, and do not notice it. Indeed, people who can eat the horrible messes of putrid maize of which they are so fond must be so obtuse of scent as to be indifferent to any ill odor. Be it as it may, in time the process of decay is supposed to be complete,--seven or eight months being the usual time. A curious ceremony, called the “hahunga,” then takes place. The friends and relatives of the deceased chief are again assembled, and the bones are solemnly taken from their receptacle and cleaned. The person who cleans them is necessarily tapu, but is rendered “noa,” or common again, by the eldest son and daughter of the deceased chief eating of the sacred food offered to the dead. Should the eldest girl happen to be dead, the food is placed in a calabash, and laid in the now empty coffin, the spirit of the girl being called by name, and the food offered to her. The spirit is supposed to partake of the food; and the tapu is thus removed as effectually as if she were alive, and had visibly eaten the provisions. Should the chief have had no daughter, the nearest female relative takes the office. The usual orations are made in honor of the deceased and the merai, tiki, and other ornaments of the dead chief are then handed over to his eldest son, who thus takes possession of the post which his father had vacated, the ceremony being analogous to a coronation among Europeans. When the celebrated chief E’ Hongi, the “Scourge of New Zealand,” as he has been called, died, his children were so afraid that they would be attacked by those whom the terror of his name had kept quiet, that they wanted to omit the preliminary orations and “tangi,” and to lay his body in the “waki-tapu,” or sacred place, on the day after his death. This intention was, however, overruled, chiefly in consequence of the foresight of the dying chief. Feeling that his end was close at hand, he rallied his sons round him, sent for all his warlike stores, the merais, patus, muskets, ammunition, and, above all, the armor which he had received from George IV., and bequeathed them to his children. He was asked what “utu,” or satisfaction, should be exacted for his death, but replied that the only utu which his spirit would desire was, that his tribe should be valiant, and repel any attack that might be made upon them. But for this really noble sentiment, there would have been great slaughter at his death, in order to furnish attendants for him.