Origin and Migrations of the Polynesian Nation. 103 



dense the vegetation, that a stranger to the place might pass 

 along it without being aware of their existence. 



" These structures bear every indication of a very high 

 antiquity, and EZory-Kory, who was my authority in all matters 

 of scientific research, gave me to understand that they were 

 coeval with the creation of the world ; that the great gods them- 

 selves were the builders, and that they would endure until time 

 shall be no more. Kory-Kory's prompt explanation, and his 

 attributing the work to a Divine origin, at once convinced me 

 that neither he nor the rest of his countrymen knew anything 

 about them. 



" As I gazed upon this monument, doubtless the work of an 

 extinct and forgotten race, thus buried in the green nook of an 

 island at the ends of the earth, the existence of which was yester- 

 day unknown, a stronger feeling of awe came over me than if I 

 had stood musing at the mighty base of the Pyramid of Cheops. 

 There are no inscriptions, no sculpture, no clue, by which to 

 conjecture its history — nothing but the dumb stones. How 

 many generations of those majestic trees, which overshadow them 

 have grown and flourished and decayed since first they were 

 erected !" (Typee, page 173.) 



And in reference to the period at which these remarkable 

 monuments of the ancient Polynesian race were originally 

 erected, the same intelligent writer coincides entirely with myself 

 as to their high antiquity. 



"These remains," he observes, "naturally suggest many inter- 

 esting reflections. They establish the great age of the island." 

 * * * * " For my own part, I think it just as probable that 

 human beings were living in the valleys of the Marquesas three 

 thousand years ago, as that they were inhabiting the land of 

 Egypt. (Ibid.) 



Now surely the men who could move and sculpture such 

 immense blocks of stone as these were not savages. On the 

 contrary, it is evident that they had had the whole type of the 

 civilisation that prevailed in the world, at the time when their 

 forefathers were separated from the rest of mankind in their 

 island homes, photographed, so to speak, upon their minds, and 

 ready to be reproduced in all its parts whenever they should, find 

 a suitable field for its reproduction or development. 



I should now proceed, in confirmation of my theory of the 

 derivation of the entire Indo-American race from Polynesia, to 

 show that the peculiar type of Indo-American civilisation, so 

 different from anything that had ever been seen or heard of 

 among the rest of mankind, wa» exclusively Polynesian, and cast 

 in a Polynesian mould. I should also have proceeded to shew 

 you that many singular customs and practices, unknown to the 

 rest of mankind, were common to the wilder Indo-American 



