48 
THE TWO EACES WHICH PEOPLED POLYNESIA. 
the crown of the head.* The being delivered over to Satan 
appears to imply, that the hedge which God makes around 
his people is removed from those who renounce his worship, 
hence the serpent reigns supreme over the heathen world. 
In China the dragon is the sacred emblem of the nation, 
and seems to have been derived from the Aborigines of that 
country, and a proof that they were once if not still snake 
worshippers. 
Huge reptiles were supposed by the Maori to exist in 
deep bends of rivers or under hills ; they were called Tani- 
whas — men who were drowned were said to be pulled under 
water by them ; all land slips and avalanches were thought 
to be occasioned by them. When Te Heuheu the head 
chief of Taupo was killed by a landslip, with near sixty of 
his tribe, he attributed the approaching destruction to his 
having omitted his usual offering to the Taniwa, and the 
avalanche overwhelmed him whilst making it. 
The human body was thought to be apportioned out to 
these reptiles ; each part of it being under the separate 
dominion of one of them — the head under one, the heart 
under another, the breast, the limbs, and stomach under 
others, in fact every inch had its reptile ; thus in whatever 
part the pain was felt, it was supposed to arise from the 
reptile presiding over it, and their most potent spells and 
incantations were uttered to dislodge the evil spirit. Reptile 
gods were considered the most ancient. 
Serpent worship therefore may truly be said to have en- 
circled the southern hemisphere, and presents a strong point 
of connection between all the various races which are found 
in it; for although it first originated with the black race, 
when it succumbed to the more powerful succeeding ones, 
they gradually adopted and incorporated it in their religious 
institutions, and may not this worship be traced up to the 
earliest period when man fell and his degenerate posterity 
worshipped through fear the being by whom they were 
overcome. 
India presents many points of agreement with Polynesia, 
* Job, chap. ii. 6, 7. 
