246 POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
and hue, and perfumed with odours of every fra¬ 
grance. The air was free from every noxious 
vapour, pure, and salubrious. Every species 
of enjoyment, to which the Areois and other 
favoured classes had been accustomed on earth, 
was to be participated there; while rich viands 
and delicious fruits were supposed to be fur¬ 
nished in abundance, for the celebration of their 
sumptuous festivals. Handsome youths and 
women, purotu anae , all perfection, thronged the 
place. These honours and gratifications were only 
for the privileged orders, the Areois and the 
chiefs, who could afford to pay the priests for the 
passport thither : the charges were ,so great, that 
the common people seldom or never thought of 
attempting to procure it for their relatives; besides, 
it is probable that .the high distinction kept up 
between the chiefs and people here, would be 
expected to exist in a future state, and to exclude 
every individual of the lower ranks, from the 
society of his superiors. 
Those who had been kings of Areois in this 
world, were the same there for ever. They were 
supposed to be employed in a succession of amuse¬ 
ments and indulgences similar to those to which 
they had been addicted on earth, often perpetrating 
the most unnatural crimes, which their tutelar gods 
were represented as sanctioning by their own 
example. 
These are some of the principal traditions and 
particulars relative to this singular and demoral¬ 
izing institution, which, if not confined to the 
Georgian and Society Islands, appears to have 
been patronized and carried to a greater extent 
there than among any other islands of the Pacific. 
Considering the imagined source in which it ori- 
