POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
2m 
perceived it at a short distance before they approached, 
and, influenced by fear, sprang from the board, and endea¬ 
voured to escape. He was pursued, and crippled by a 
large stone, and thus secured by the murderers. I was 
acquainted with two persons, who were sawyers, and 
resided some time in the island of Huahine, who had 
both been engaged in burying one of their companions, 
merely because they felt the few attentions required, a 
burden. One of them, whose name was Papehara, is 
dead; the other is still living. 
It is unnecessary to add to these details. Every friend 
to humanity will rejoice to know, that since the subver¬ 
sion of that system, under the sanction of which they 
were practised, they have ceased; and that now, from the 
influence of Christian principles, although the aged do 
not receive that veneration which is paid to gray hairs 
and length of years in some countries, yet that they are 
treated with kindness. 
The sick are also nursed with attention by their 
relatives and children; and so far fx’om deeming it a 
burden to attend to them, in Eimeo, Huahine, and, I 
believe, in some of the other islands, the natives have 
formed benevolent societies among themselves for the 
purpose of building houses, supplying with food and 
clothing those who, in their old age and helpless state, 
have no friends or children to take care of them. In 
these dwellings they are lodged, and clothed, and fed. 
Persons also visit them for the purpose of reading the 
Scriptures, and praying with them; their present 
necessities are supplied, the decline of life made easy, 
and their passage to the grave comparatively tranquil 
and happy. It is only necessary to contrast this with the 
former treatment of individuals under similar circum- 
