THROUGH HAWAII* 
363 
been surprised at this, and believe it arises from the 
superstitious dread the people entertain respecting the 
places where dead bodies are deposited, which they 
believe resorted to by the spirits of those buried there. 
Like most ignorant and barbarous nations, they imagine 
that apparitions are frequently seen, and often injure 
those who come in their way. Their funerals take 
place in the night, to avoid observation; for we have 
been told, that if the people were to see a party carry¬ 
ing a dead body past their houses, they would abuse 
them, or even throw stones at them, for not taking it 
some other way, supposing the spirit would return to 
and fro to the former abode of the deceased by the 
path along which the body had been borne to the place 
of interment. 
The worshippers of Pēlē threw a part of the bones 
of their dead into the volcano, under the impression 
that the spirits of the deceased would then be admitted 
to the society of the volcanic deities, and that their in¬ 
fluence would preserve the survivors from the ravages 
of volcanic fire. 
The fishermen sometimes wrapped their dead in red 
native cloth, and threw them into the sea, to be de¬ 
voured by the sharks. Under the influence of a belief 
in the transmigration of souls, they supposed the spirit 
of the departed would animate the shark by which the 
body was devoured, and that the survivors would be 
spared by those voracious monsters, in the event of 
their being overtaken by any accident at sea. 
The bodies of criminals who had broken tabu, after 
having been slain to appease the anger of the god 
whose tabu, or prohibition, they had broken, were 
buried within the precincts of the heiau. The bones 
