t amounted to deification.[709]

[Sidenote: Oracles given by the priest under the inspiration of the god.
Paroxysm of inspiration.]

The principal duty of the priest was to reveal to men the will of the
god, and this he always did through the direct inspiration of the deity.
The revelation was usually made in response to an enquiry or a prayer;
the supplicant asked, it might be, for a good crop of yams or taro, for
showers of rain, for protection in battle, for a safe voyage, or for a
storm to drive canoes ashore, so that the supplicant might rob, murder,
and eat the castaways. To lend force to one or other of these pious
prayers the worshipper brought a whale's tooth to the temple and
presented it to the priest. The man of god might have had word of his
coming and time to throw himself into an appropriate attitude. He might,
for example, be seen lying on the floor near the sacred corner, plunged
in a profound meditation. On the entrance of the enquirer the priest
would rouse himself so far as to get up and then seat himself with his
back to the white cloth, down which the deity was expected to slide into
the medium's body. Having received the whale's tooth he would abstract
his mind from all worldly matters and contemplate the tooth for some
time with rapt attention. Presently he began to tremble, his limbs
twitched, his features were distorted. These symptoms, the visible
manifestation of the entrance of the spirit into him, gradually
increased in violence till his whole frame was convulsed and shook as
with a strong fit of ague: his veins swelled: the circulation of the
blood was quickened. The man was now possessed and inspired by the god:
his own human personality was for a time in abeyance: all that he said
and did in the paroxysm passed for the words and acts of the indwelling
deity. Shrill cries of "_Koi au! Koi au!_" "It is I! It is I!" filled
the air, proclaiming the actual presence of the powerful spirit in the
vessel of flesh and blood. In giving the oracular response the priest's
eyes protruded from their sockets and rolled as in a frenzy: his voice
rose into a squeak: his face was pallid, his lips livid, his breathing
depressed, his whole appearance that of a furious madman. At last sweat
burst from every pore, tears gushed from his eyes: the strain on the
organism was visibly relieved; and the symptoms gradually abated. Then
he would look round with a vacant stare: the god within him would cry,
"I depart