UNCLE IN ENGLAND. 63 



minds of the people, and that the progress of 

 Christianity and civilization will advance toge- 

 ther. It appears to have been a spontaneous 

 act of those intelligent and amiable islanders ; 

 and when the Blonde frigate arrived there in 

 1825, the new faith they had adopted had al- 

 ready materially purified their morals and im- 

 proved their manners. 



Besides wooden idols, the uninstructed na- 

 tives had long worshipped the deities of their 

 island at the foot of the stupendous mountain 

 of Mouna Roa, imagining their favourite abode 

 to be in the volcanoes it contained. Offerings 

 were frequently made to court their favour ; and 

 at every fresh eruption of lava hogs were thrown 

 alive into those fiery gulfs, to appease the anger 

 of Peli, the principal deity. To put an end to 

 these superstitions, Kapiolani, the wife of a chief 

 of high rank who had recently embraced Chris- 

 tianity, determined to descend into the great 

 crater, and, by thus braving the volcanic deities in 

 their very home, she hoped to convince the people 

 that they existed only in their imagination. A 

 crowd of her friends and vassals accompanied 

 her up the mountain, to the first precipice that 

 bounds the sunken plain : there most of them 

 stopped or turned back ; and at the second, her 

 remaining companions earnestly implored her to 

 desist from her dangerous enterprise^ which could 



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