POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
217 
intoxication^ yet it induced the Missionaries to fear that 
he^ like Agrippa^ was but almost a Christian. They 
could not but indulge unfavourable apprehensions on 
his account; yet, considering his previous habits, that 
intemperance had ever been the vice to which he was 
most addicted, and the peculiar temptations to which 
his residence in Tahiti had exposed him, they could not 
readily relinquish the hopes they had entertained re¬ 
specting him. 
The numerous attendance and increasing earnestness 
of the people, induced the Missionaries to meet them 
for Divine worship twice on the Lord’s day, and once 
during the week. In addition to these public instruc¬ 
tions, they held a meeting every Sabbath evening with 
those whose names had been written down as the 
disciples of Christ, and spent much time iii more 
private endeavours to direct the views, and confirm 
the belief, of those who were desirous to be added to 
their number. These sacred exercises were enlivened 
by the natives, who united with their teachers in 
celebrating the praises of Jehovah, a number of the 
natives having been taught to sing hymns that had been 
composed in the native language. The Missionaries 
had often, with mingled feelings of horror and pity, 
heard their songs of licentiousness or of war, as well as 
the cantillations of their heathen worship, and their 
songs in honour of their idols; and it is hardly possible 
to form an adequate idea of the delightful transport 
with which, at first, they must have heard the high 
praises of the Almighty ascend from native voices. 
Upaparu, a principal chief in the eastern part of 
Tahiti, came over to Eimeo for the express purpose 
of seeking Christian instruction, and attending the 
2 F 
