Origin and Migrations of the Polynesian Nation. 113 



with mortar ; neither nave they been squared to join closely to 

 each other, like hewn stones in a European building, although 

 the stones of ancient Peruvian buildings are sometimes found 

 hewn into regular forms ; but cavities have been wrought with 

 the utmost exactness, and with incredible labour, in one stone to 

 receive the natural or accidental protuberances of another. 



Tumuli, constructed, in some instances, of immense stones, and 

 in others, as on the banks of the Ohio, of mounds of earth, are 

 also found among the remains of ancient civilisation, both in the 

 South Sea Islands and in America. I have already mentioned 

 the tomb of Toobo Tooi, in the island of Tonga, constructed of 

 immense stones that must have been rafted across the sea from 

 some other island, as Tonga, is a mere mass of coral, and perfectly 

 flat. 



Remains of ancient and regular fortifications have also been 

 discovered in both continents of America ; and the circumstance 

 has repeatedly awakened much curiosity respecting the origin, 

 the history, and the fate of the nation that has left behind it 

 these memorials of its ancient civilisation. But regular fortifi- 

 cations of a similar kind are still met with in all parts of the 

 South Sea Islands. In some islands they are constructed of Avails 

 of loose stones piled on each other on the tops of hills, as in New 

 Zealand; in others, as in Ascension Island, in the Northern 

 Pacific, of a wall of thirty feet high, enclosing a harbour, and 

 formed of large blocks of dressed stone built up with great 

 architectural skill but without cement of any kind ; in others 

 they are formed of strong palisades, like the Burman Stockades, 

 as in the level island of Tonga ; and in others still they consist 

 of some artificial addition to a place of great natural strength, as 

 in the district of Atehuru, in Tahiti. In short, the South Sea 

 Islanders have evidently been in a sufficiently advanced state of 

 civilisation to enable them to construct fortifications, and to 

 adapt these fortifications, in regard to the materials employed in 

 their construction, to the nature of the country in which they 

 were required. This part of our subject is so very interesting 

 that 1 shall willingly avail myself of the following passage from 

 Mr. Ellis :— 



" The fortress at Maeva, in Huahine," one of the Society 

 Islands, " bordering on a lake of the same name, is probably the 

 best artificial fortification in the islands. Being a square of 

 about half a mile on each side, it encloses many acres of ground 

 well stocked with breadfruit, containing several springs,'* and 

 having within its precincts the principal temple of their tutelar 

 deity. The walls are of solid stonework, in height twelve feet. 

 They are even and regularly paved at the top. On the top of 

 the walls (which in some places were ten or twelve feet thick) 

 the warriors kept watch and slept. Their houses were built 



