these little statues, and I remarked in them an astonishing feeling for
artistic design."[155]

[155] "Extrait du Journal de M. de Sainson," in J. Dumont
d'Urville, _Voyage de l'Astrolabe, Histoire du Voyage_, iv.
(Paris, 1832) pp. 361 _sq._

Some sixteen years later a Catholic missionary, living among the heathen
population of Tongataboo, wrote thus: "Nothing equals the care which
they take in the burial of their dead. As soon as a native has breathed
his last, the neighbours are informed, and immediately all the women
come to weep about the corpse. Here the men never weep. The body is kept
thus for a day or two, during which they are busy building a tomb near
the dwelling of the deceased's family. The sepulchral house is neat,
built on an eminence, surrounded by a pretty fence of choice bamboos;
the enclosure is planted with all kinds of odoriferous shrubs,
especially evergreens. Finally, the monument is covered by a roof
artistically constructed. For the tombs of kings and the greatest chiefs
they go to distant islands to find huge stones to crown the grave. I
have seen one twenty-four feet long by eight broad and at least eighteen
inches thick. One of these tombs was built by the natives of Wallis
Island, who brought the enormous blocks in immense canoes. It is
wonderful for these peoples."[156]

[156] Jerome Grange, in _Annales de la Propagation de la Foi_,
xvii. (1845) pp. 12 _sq._

Captain Erskine, who visited Tongataboo in 1849, says that "near the
landing-place at the village of Holobeka, off which we were lying, we
saw overshadowed with trees, one of the _faitokas_, or old burial-places
of the country, which, although no longer 'tabu,' are still in some
cases used as places of sepulture, and very carefully kept. This one was
an oblong square platform a few feet high, surrounded by a stone wall,
the interior being beautifully paved with coloured corals and gravel;
the house or temple, which Captain Cook and others describe as occupying
the centre, having been, I suppose, removed. I saw but one other of
these monuments during our stay among the islands, the largest of which
stands on several rows of steps, as described by all former
visitors."[157]

[157] J. E. Erskine, _Journal of a Cruise among the Islands of
the Western Pacific_ (London, 1853), p. 130.

Thomas West, who lived as a missionary in the Tongan islands from 1846
to 1855, tells us that "chiefs were usually interr