TRADITIONS OF THE DELUGE. 389 
mountain was the heap or collection of the stones 
and the wood. The earth and the rocks remained 
of the land ; the shrubs were destroyed by the sea. 
They descended, and gazed with astonishment: 
There were no houses, nor cocoa-nuts, nor palm- 
trees, nor bread-fruit, nor hibiscus, nor grass ; all 
was destroyed by the sea. They two dwelt toge¬ 
ther. The woman brought forth two children; 
one was a son, the other a daughter. They 
grieved that there was no food for their children. 
Again the mother brought forth, but still there was 
no food. The children grew up without food ; 
then the bread-fruit bore fruit, and the cocoa-nut, 
and every other kind of food. In three days en¬ 
circled or covered was the land with food. The 
land became covered with men. From two persons, 
the father and the mother, filled was the land.” 
The principal facts of this singular and curious 
account, though blended together by the natives 
in the order in which they are here given, pro¬ 
bably refer to two distinct events. The total inun¬ 
dation .of the land is perhaps a relic of the account 
of the deluge, and the tearing up and falling of 
the trees and stones, to some violent hurricane or 
volcanic eruption. 
The tradition, which prevails in the Leeward 
Islands, is intimately connected with the island of 
Raiatea. According to this, shortly after the first 
peopling of the world by the descendants of Taata, 
Ruahatu, the Neptune of the South Sea Islanders, 
was reposing among the coralline groves in the 
depths of the ocean, on a spot that, as his resort, 
was sacred. A fisherman, either through forget¬ 
fulness or disregard of the tabu, and sacredness of 
the place, paddled his canoe upon the forbidden 
waters, and lowered his hooks among the branching 
