14 A VOYAGE TO JAN. 



I shall now return to our transactions on shore at 

 the observatory, where we had not been long settled, 

 before we discovered, in our neighbourhood, the 

 habitations of a society of priests, whose regular 

 attendance at the Moral had excited our curiosity. 

 Their huts stood round a pond of water, and were 

 surrounded by a grove of cocoa-nut trees, which 

 separated them from the beach and the rest of the 

 village, and gave the place an air of religious retire- 

 ment. On my acquainting Captain Cook with these 

 circumstances, he resolved to pay them a visit ; and 

 as he expected to be received in the same manner as 

 before, he brought Mr. Webber with him to make a 

 drawing of the ceremony. 



On his arrival at the beach, he was conducted to 

 a sacred building called Harre-7io-Orono, or the 

 house of Orono, and seated before the entrance, at 

 the foot of a wooden idol, of the same kind with 

 those on the Moral, I was here again made to sup- 

 port one of his arms, and after wrapping him in 

 red cloth, Kaireekeea, accompanied by twelve priests, 

 made an offering of a pig with the usual solemnities. 

 The pig was then strangled, and a fire being kindled, 

 it was thrown into the embers, and after the hair was 

 singed off, it was again presented, with a repetition 

 of the chanting, in the manner before described. 

 The dead pig was then held for a short time under 

 the Captain's nose ; after which it was laid, with a 

 cocoa-nut, at his feet, and the performers sat down. 



same success, which he attributes to the want of the necessary 

 precautions in killing and handling the beasts; to their being 

 hung up and opened before they had sufficient time to bleed, by 

 which means the blood-vessels were exposed to the air, and the 

 blood condensed before it had time to empty itself; and to their 

 being hard driven and bruised. He adds, that having himself 

 attended to the killing of an ox, which was carefully taken on 

 board the Martin, he salted a part of it, which at the end of the 

 week was found to have taken the salt completely, and he has 

 no doubt would have kept for any length of time ; but the ex- 

 periment was not tried. 



