and their disaffection proved that the germ of
future disorders was not wholly extinct. The King chose Wahu for his
residence, because this island was in the best state for defence; and
giving himself up entirely to dissipation, sunk lower and lower in the
estimation of his subjects. Karemaku was the good genius who watched
over the welfare of the country, while its monarch was wasting his hours
and his health in orgies, at which he was frequently known to empty a
bottle of rum at a draught. It was not to be supposed that a king
addicted to such habits should conceive any projects of utility or
advantage for his people; he wished, however, to distinguish himself by
some effort in their favour, or at least to relieve them from the
trammels of superstition. He was a freethinker in a bad sense. He hated
the religion of his country, because it laid some restraints upon his
inclinations, and he determined to overthrow it; not for the purpose of
introducing a better, a task to which his feeble mind was unequal, but
for that of at once relieving himself and his subjects from ceremonies
which he considered useless, because he undervalued the precepts of
morality interwoven with them, and for the sake of which his father had
always conscientiously observed them.

In the fifth month of his reign, he proceeded in a violent and brutal
manner, notwithstanding all the remonstrances of Karemaku, to the
execution of his design. Having previously arranged his plans with some
chiefs, the companions of his excesses, he invited the principal
inhabitants of the islands to a sumptuous banquet. After the wine and
rum had produced their wonted effects, females were introduced, and
compelled to partake of the feast. These poor creatures, having no
suspicion of the King's intentions, shrunk with terror from a
profanation punishable with death. But their resistance was unavailing:
they were not only constrained to sit down to the repast in company with
the men, but even to eat pork; and thus, to the great astonishment of
such guests as were not in the secret, to violate, at the royal command,
a double Tabu. A murmur arose; but the greater part of the company were
under the influence of liquor, and the King now openly proclaimed his
intentions. His auditors inquired in alarm what crime the Gods had
committed, that they should be thus unceremoniously dismissed; and
besought him not to occasion his own destruction and that of the
country, by provok