making his
way to the tableland he passed through a gap which from a distance he
had supposed to be a natural fissure in the rocks; but on arriving at it
he discovered, to his surprise, that the gap was in fact a great fosse
formed by the hand of man, being excavated in some places and built up
at others, while on one side, next to the rise of the hill, it was
further heightened by a parapet wall. When, passing through the fosse,
he issued upon the tableland, which is a level space of some twenty
acres in extent, he perceived the monument, "a truncated conical
structure or _Heidenmauer_ of such huge dimensions as must have required
the labour of a great multitude to construct. So little did I expect,"
he says, "in this neighbourhood to meet with any example of human
architecture, and so rudely monstrous was the appearance of this
cyclopean building, that from its peculiar form, and from the vegetation
with which it was overgrown, I might have passed it by, supposing it to
have been a volcanic hillock, had not my attention been attracted by the
stonework of the fosse. I hastened to ascend it. It was about twenty
feet high by one hundred in diameter. It was circular with straight
[perpendicular?] sides; the lower tiers of stone were very large, they
were lava blocks, some of which would weigh at least a ton, which must
have been rolled or moved on skids to their present places. They were
laid in courses; and in two places near the top seemed to have been
entrances to the inside, as in one appeared a low cave choked with rocks
and tree roots. If there had been chambers within, they were probably
narrow and still existing, as there was no sign of depression on the
crown of the work, which was flat and covered with flat stones, among
which grew both trees and shrubs. It is likely that it was not in itself
intended as a place of defence, but rather as a base or platform upon
which some building of importance, perhaps of timber, had been erected,
no doubt in the centre of a village, as many foundations of a few feet
high were near it. The fosse, when unbroken, and its inner wall entire,
was probably crossed by a foot-bridge, to be withdrawn on the approach
of an enemy; and the little gap, by which I had entered, closed, so that
this must have been a place of great security. The Samoan natives, as
far as I have been able to learn, have no tradition of what people
inhabited this mountain fastness."[134]

[134] H. B. Sterndal