blood of the Lamb,” or, “The Son of Man goes forth to war, a golden crown to gain; His blood-red banner streams afar—­who follows in his train?” But those striking in might prefer such a phrase as, “The old white pig ran into the sea,” or, “Johnny Brown, I love your daughter,” or something not possible to write down.  It was mostly in the old Tahitian language, almost forgotten, and thus unknown to the foreign preachers.  Sex and religion were as mingled here as in America.

The airs were as wild as they were melodious; here a rippling torrent of ra, ra, ra-ra-ra, and la, la, la-la-la breaking in on the sustained verses of the leaders; falsetto notes, high and strident, savage and shrilling, piercing the thrumming diapason of the men; long, droning tones like bagpipes, bubbling sounds like water flowing; and all in perfect time.  The clear, fascinating false soprano of the woman leader had a cadence of ecstasy, and I marked her under a lamp.  Her head was thrown back, her eyes were closed, and her features set as in a trance.  Her throat and mouth moved, and her nostrils quivered, her countenance glorified by her visions which had transported her to the bosom of Abraham.

The atmosphere rang as with the chimes of a cathedral, the echoes—­there were none in reality—­returning from roof and tree, and I had the feeling of the air being made up of voices, and of whirling in this magic ether.  The woman I observed would seem about to stop, her voice falling away almost to no sound, and the prolonged drone of the chorus dying out, when, as if she had come to life again, she sang out at the top of her lungs, and the ranks again took up their tones.  I could almost trace the imposition of the religious strain upon the savage, the Christian upon the heathen, like the negro spirituals of Georgia, and I sat back in my chair, and forgot the scene in the thoughts induced by the himene.

The souls of the Tahitians were not much changed by all their outward transformation.  Superficial, indeed, are the accomplishments of missionaries, merchants, and masters among these Maoris.  The old guard dies, but never surrenders; the boast of Napoleon’s soldiers might be paraphrased by the voice of the Maori spirit.  Our philosophy, our catechisms, and our rules have not uprooted the convictions and thought methods of centuries.  Bewildered by our ambitions, fashions, and inventions, they emulate us feebly, but in their heart of hearts think us mad.  Old chiefs and chiefesses I have had confess to me that they were stunned by the novelties, commands, and demands of the papaa (foreigner), but that their confusion was not liking or belief.  In his youth, in the midst of these bustling whites, the Tahitian imitates them and feels sometimes humiliated that he is not one of them.  But in sober middle age all these new desires begin to leave him, and he becomes a Maori again.  The older he grows, the less attractive seem the white man’s ways and ambitions, though pride, habit, and perhaps an acquired fear of the hell painted by priests and preachers from the distant lands keep him church-going.  Gods may differ, but devils never.