POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 497 
the year 1824, was unusually interesting. This district 
had formerly been distinguished, even among the dis¬ 
tricts of Tahiti, for the turbulent and warlike dis¬ 
positions of its inhabitants, and the ardour of their 
zeal in the service of their idols—^the magnitude of 
the idol temples—^the sanguinary character of their 
worship—and the presence of Oro, the great war- 
god of the South*Sea Islanders. Within the precincts 
of the Missionary station, not far from the place of 
worship, one of the great national maraes formerly 
stood,—where the image of Oro had often been kept, 
where human sacrifices had frequently been offered, where 
the inauguration of the last heathen king who reigned 
in Tahiti took place, and where every cruelty and 
every abomination connected with paganism had been 
practised for ages. After the subversion of idolatry, 
this marae was divested of its glory, stripped of all 
its idolatrous appendages, and robbed of its gods, 
while the houses they occupied were committed to 
the flames. Still the massy pile of solid stonework, 
constituting one end of the area which the marae 
included, remained in a state of partial dilapidation— 
an imposing monument of the reign of terror, as 
they denominated idolatry. The natives were, how¬ 
ever, determined to remove even this vestige of the 
system of which they so long had been the vassals, 
and therefore levelled, for this occasion, the mighty 
pile, and with the materials formed a spacious solid 
platform, three feet high, one hundred and ninety- 
four feet long, and one hundred and fifty-seven feet 
wide; the whole surrounded with a stone wall ce¬ 
mented with lime. Here a festival was held on the 
11th of June, 1824. Upon this platform ninety tables 
3s 
