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expressed their regret that so much time and property should be appropriated to the erection of a building, which would be of far less general utility than one of smaller dimensions. But the king was not thus to be diverted from his original design; and however injudicious the plan he pursued might be, the motives by which he was influenced were certainly commendable. He frequently observed, that the heaviest labour and the most spacious and enduring buildings ever erected, were in connexion with the worship of their former deities, illustrating his remarks by allusion to the national maraes at Atehuru, Tautira, and other parts; declaring, at the same time, his conviction that the religion of the Bible was so much superior to that under which they formerly lived, and the service of the true God so happy and beneficial in its influence, that they ought to erect a much better place for the homage of Jehovah, than had ever been reared for the dark mysteries and cruel sacrifices connected with the worship of their idols.

In this statement of his motives, we have every reason to believe the king was sincere, and we consequently felt less inclined to object. It is probable, also, that considering the Tahitians as a Christian people, he had some desire to emulate the conduct of Solomon in building a temple, as well as surpassing in knowledge the kings and chieftains of the islands. When, in the course of conversation, the building was mentioned, or he was asked why he reared one so large, he inquired whether Solomon was not a good king, and whether he did not erect a house for Jehovah superior to every building in Judea, or the surrounding countries.

Excepting its lengthened vista, and the singular appearance of the ornamented roof, there is nothing very

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prepossessing in the interior of the Royal Mission Chapel; and its length is so very disproportioned to its width and elevation, that the exterior is neither elegant nor imposing; and although it breaks the uniformity and loneliness of the landscape, it can hardly be said that its introduction has been an improvement. Pomare, however, appeared to experience great satisfaction in superintending its erection, and in marking its progress. He was present, surrounded by not fewer than seven thousand of his subjects, when it was for the first time appropriated to the sacred purpose for which it had been built, and his feelings on that occasion were, no doubt, of a superior and delightful kind-very different from those of his predecessors in the government of Tahiti, and especially of his father; who, when the Missionaries built their little chapel at Matavai, for which he had furnished the timber, sent a large fish, requesting it might be suspended in the temple of the God of Britain, that he might share his favour, and secure his aid, as well as that of the gods of Tahiti.

The first places of worship erected by the natives, after the subversion of idolatry, were comparatively small in size, and differed but little from the common native houses, excepting in the manner in which the interior was fitted up. This was generally done by fixing benches from one end to the other, and erecting a kind of desk or table equally distant from both extremities, and near one of the sides. These chapels were formerly numerous, and the inhabitants of each district had their own fare bure, or house of prayer, in which they were accustomed, even in the most remote part of the island, to assemble regularly twice on the Sabbath, and once during the week, for reading the scriptures and

prayer. Such was the rapidity with which places for public worship were erected, that at the close of 1818, twelve months only after the battle of Narii, near Bunaauïa, there were sixty-six in the island of Tahiti alone.

Since the establishment of the stations in Huahine and the other islands, the number has been greatly diminished; the people in many parts have resorted to the Missionary settlement, particularly on the Sabbath; and the places formerly used as chapels have been converted into schools. Places now used for worship in the islands, although not so numerous as formerly, are much more convenient and substantial. The walls are either of plank or plaster, the floors are boarded, and the area within is fitted up with a pulpit, desk, and pews, or seats. Some have neat and commodious galleries; and in the island of Eimeo, on the site of the temple of which Patii was priest, a neat and substantial chapel has been built with white hewn coral.

I have not heard that glass windows have been introduced into the chapels of any of the stations. Cushions have not yet intruded into any of the pews, and only into one of the pulpits.

No native chapel is yet furnished with a public clock; and although it would be a valuable article, there is not such a thing in the South Sea Islands. The stations have also been hitherto but indifferently supplied with a far more useful appendage to their places of public worship than even a dial; namely, a bell. Whatever may be said of the inutility of bells in churches or chapels in civilized countries, where public clocks are numerous, and watches almost universal-the same objections will not apply to a people destitute of these, and having no means of denoting the hour of the day, except by men

tioning the situation of the sun in the heavens. In the South Sea Islands they certainly are not a needless article, and we found it impossible to induce the people to attend the schools, or assemble for public worship at any regular or appointed season, without some such method of calling them together. For several years there was, in all the islands, only one small hand-bell, not so large as that ordinarily used by the belman in an English market-town.

As the number of stations increased, bells were sent from England, but they were either too small, badly made, or carelessly used, and were frequently broken a few days after their arrival. Various were the expedients resorted to for supplying the deficiency thus occasioned, and I have often been amused at beholding the singular substitutes employed. In the Sandwich Islands they sometimes, I think, used a bullock's horn; in others, a long tin horn resembling that used by a mail-coach guard; but, in general, a far more classic instrument, a eautiful marine shell, a species of turbo, or trumpet-shell, varying in size according to the power of the individual by whom it might be sounded. This, in fact, was the trumpet carried by the king's messenger; and I have often been delighted to see a tall and active man, or a lively and almost ruddy boy, with a light cloak or scarf thrown loosely over his shoulder, a wreath of flowers on his head, and a maro or girdle around his loins,—a shell, suspended by a braided cord, carelessly hanging on his arm-going round the village, stopping at intervals to sound his shell, and afterwards, perhaps, inviting the listening throng to hasten to the school, or to attend the place of worship. I procured a trumpet-shell actually used for these pur

poses in Oahu, during my residence, and consider it one of the most interesting curiosities which I was enabled to deposit in the Missionary Museum.

At Eimeo, a thick hoop of iron, resembling the tier of a small carriage-wheel, suspended by a rope of twisted bark, and struck with an iron bolt, was substituted for a bell. At Huahine, during the greater part of my residence there, we had a square bar of iron hanging, by a cord of purau bark, from a high cocoa-nut tree that grew near the chapel; and our only means of calling the inhabitants of the settlement together was, by appointing a person, at the proper hour, to strike it several minutes with hard stone. It had been so long in use, that the bar of iron was considerably battered, and almost flattened by the blows.

The Missionaries at Raiatea procured what is called a pig of cast-iron ballast, a solid piece about three or four feet long, and six or nine inches square, with a hole through one end. Near the chapel they erected a low frame, consisting of two upright posts, and a crosspiece at the top, resembling a gallows, from the centre of which the pig of iron was suspended; and when used, struck with a stone. What the natives thought of it I do not know, but to those who were accustomed to associate with a gallows, and any object so attached to it, only ideas of an execution, or of a criminal hung in irons, its appearance was not adapted to awaken very gratifying feelings.

At Borabora, for a long time after Mr. Orsmond's settlement there, their only substitute for a bell was a broad carpenter's axe. The handle was taken out, a string of braided cinet passed through the eye, and when the inhabitants were to assemble, a native boy

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