chanting some time alone, and being answered by the rest, and pouring a
little out on the ground, he drinks off. A piece of the flesh that is
dressed is next cut off, without any selection of the part of the animal,
which, together with some of the vegetables, being deposited at the foot of
the image of the _Eatooa_, and a hymn chanted, their meal commences. A
ceremony of much the same kind is also performed by the chiefs, whenever
they drink _ava_ between their meals.

Human sacrifices are more frequent here, according to the account of the
natives themselves, than in any other islands we visited. These horrid
rites are not only had recourse to upon the commencement of war, and
preceding great battles and other signal enterprises, but the death of any
considerable chief calls for a sacrifice of one or more _Towtows_,
according to his rank; and we were told, that ten men were destined to
suffer on the death of Terreeoboo. What may, if any thing possibly can,
lessen, in some small degree, the horror of this practice is, that the
unhappy victims have not the most distant intimation of their fate. Those
who are fixed upon to fall, are set upon with clubs wherever they happen to
be, and, after being dispatched, are brought dead to the place, where the
remainder of the rites are completed. The reader will here call to his
remembrance the skulls of the captives that had been sacrificed at the
death of some great chief, and which were fixed on the rails round the top
of the _morai_ at Kakooa. We got a farther piece of intelligence upon this
subject at the village of Kowrowa; where, on our enquiring into the use of
a small piece of ground, inclosed with a stone-fence, we were told that it
was an _Here-eere_, or burying-ground of a chief; and there, added our
informer, pointing to one of the corners, lie the _tangata_ and _waheene
taboo_, or the man and woman who were sacrificed at his funeral.

To this class of their customs may also be referred that of knocking out