THE SANDWICH ISLANDS. 509 



worn in the same manner as the Hook-ornament, as if the one 

 ornament were a substitute for the other. The Hawaians habi- 

 tually carried their gods to battle with them, and in the plates 

 of " Cook's Voyages " several deities are represented as borne in 

 each fully manned canoe. Hence it seems probable that the 

 people would wish to carry a representation of a god constantly 

 with them, and the comparison of the form of the Hook-ornament 

 with that of the recent-shaped and hollow-faced images of gods, 

 seems to leave little doubt that the hook represented the head 

 of a god ; and thus as a religious emblem, suspended round the 

 neck, corresponded to those in vogue in the case of so many 

 other religions. It may thus well be compared to the well-known 

 jade " Tikis " of New Zealand, similarly worn, which, however, 

 represented ancestors and tutelary deities rather than gods.* 



It must have been a matter of great labour to work hard 

 ivory or stone into the form of the Hook-ornament. The curves 

 in all examples seem to correspond closely ; and there is a ridge 

 on the outer-curved surface of the hook, which appears to 

 represent the crest of the helmet. The necklace and ornament 

 is termed in Hawaian " Lei palaoa," simply " whale's tooth " 

 necklace. 



These speculations as to the meaning of the Hook-ornament 

 will, I hope, elicit further information on the subject. General 

 Lane Fox has rendered familiar to ethnologists the curious tran- 

 sitions of form which representations of the human faces may 

 undergo in savage decoration under the process of successive 

 copyings. The details of the representation gradually dwindle 

 away ; a mere simple transverse crescent remains to represent 

 the entire face of a man on some of the paddles of New Ireland.f 



Many similar degenerations of form in copying of decora- 

 tion are well known ; and a well-marked instance is to be seen 

 in the crockets on the pinnacles of the Bodleian Library at 



* The origin of tattooing in Polynesia is supposed possibly to have 

 been from the desire to mark the body permanently with the figure of 

 the tutelary deity. Waitz, " Anthropologic der Naturvolker," 6 ter Th. 

 Leipzig, 1872, s. 34-35. 



t General A. Lane Fox, F.E.S., "Address to the Department of 

 Anthropology." Report of the British Association, 1872. 



