they had for conducting themselves with propriety, besides the
fear of misfortunes in this life, replied, the agreeable and
happy feeling which a man experiences within himself when he
does any good action or conducts himself nobly and generously as
a man ought to do; and this question they answered as if they
wondered such a question should be asked" (vol. ii. p. 161).


One may read from the beginning of the book of Judges to the end
of the books of Samuel without discovering that the old
Israelites had a moral standard which differs, in any essential
respect (except perhaps in regard to the chastity of unmarried
women), from that of the Tongans. Gideon, Jephthah, Samson, and
David are strong-handed men, some of whom are not outdone by any
Polynesian chieftain in the matter of murder and treachery;
while Deborah's jubilation over Jael's violation of the primary
duty of hospitality, proffered and accepted under circumstances
which give a peculiarly atrocious character to the murder of the
guest; and her witch-like gloating over the picture of the
disappointment of the mother of the victim--


The mother of Sisera cried through the lattice,
Why is his chariot so long in coming? (Jud. v. 28.)


--would not have been out of place in the choral service of the
most sanguinary god in the Polynesian pantheon.

With respect to the cannibalism which the Tongans occasionally