POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
233 
their actions they were influenced by motives exactly 
corresponding with those that operated upon their own 
minds; hence they believed^ that even spirits could be 
diverted from their purposes by the offer of a larger 
bribe than they had received to carry it into effect, or 
that the efforts of one tii could be neutralized or counter¬ 
acted by another more powerful. 
Under the influence of these opinions, when any one 
was suffering from incantations, if he or his friends pos¬ 
sessed property, they immediately employed another 
sorcerer. This person was frequently called a faatre, 
causing to move or slide, who, on receiving his fee, was 
generally desired, first to discover who had practised the 
incantations which it was supposed had induced the 
sufferings : as soon as he had accomplished this, he was 
employed, with more costly presents, to engage the aid 
of his demons, that the agony and death they had endea¬ 
voured to inflict upon the subject of their malignant 
efforts, might revert to themselves—and if the demon 
employed by the second party was equally powerful with 
that employed by the first, and their presents more valu¬ 
able, it was generally supposed that they were successful. 
How affecting is the view these usages afford, of the 
mythology of these rude untutored children of nature! 
How debasing their ideas of those beings on whom they 
considered themselves dependent, and whose services 
they regarded as the principal business of their lives !— 
how degrading and brutalizing such sentiments, and 
how powerful their effect must have been, in cherishing 
that deadly hatred which often found but too congenial 
a home in their bosoms ! They were led to imagine that 
these super-human beings were engaged in perpetual 
conflict with each other, employing their dreadful powers, 
n. 2 H 
