POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
211 
of the spectators; resembling, perhaps in no small 
degree, the feeling depicted in the visages of the assem¬ 
bled Israelites, when the prophet Elijah summoned 
them to prove the power of Baal, or to acknowledge the 
omnipotence of the Lord God of Israel. short time before 
sun-set, Patii appeared, and ordered his attendants to 
apply fire to the pile. This being done, he hastened to the 
sacred depository of his gods, brought them out, not in¬ 
deed as he had been on some occasions accustomed to do, 
that they might receive the blind homage of the waiting 
populace,—but to convince the deluded multitude of the 
impotency and the vanity of the objects of their adora¬ 
tion and their dread. When he approached the burning 
pile, he laid them down on the ground. They were 
small carved wooden images, rude imitations of the 
human figure; or shapeless logs of wood, covered with 
finely braided and curiously wrought cinet of cocoa-nut 
fibres, and ornamented with red feathers. The accom¬ 
panying representations will convey some idea of the 
shape and appearance of the former kind. 
