e, quoted by R. A. Sterndale,
"Asiatic Architecture in Polynesia," _The Asiatic Quarterly
Review_, x. (July-October 1890) pp. 347-350. The writer of this
article reports the discoveries of his brother, Mr. Handley
Bathurst Sterndale.

On an adjoining tableland, approached by a steep and narrow ridge, Mr.
Sterndale saw a great number of cairns of stone, apparently graves,
disposed in rows among huge trees, the roots of which had overturned and
destroyed very many of the cairns. Here, within the numerous trunks of a
great spreading banyan tree, Mr. Sterndale found what he calls an inner
chamber, or cell, about ten feet square, the floor being paved with flat
stones and the walls built of enormous blocks of the same material,
while the roof was composed of the twisted trunks of the banyan tree,
which had grown into a solid arch and, festooned by creepers, excluded
even the faint glimmer of twilight that dimly illuminated the
surrounding forest. Disturbed by a light which the traveller struck to
explore the gloomy interior, bats fluttered about his head. In the
centre of the chamber he discovered a cairn, or rather cromlech, about
four feet high, which was formed of several stones arranged in a
triangle, with a great flat slab on the top. On the flat slab lay a
large conch shell, white with age, and encrusted with moss and dead
animalculae. The chamber or cell, enclosed by the trunks of the
banyan-tree, might have been inaccessible, if it were not that, under
the pressure of the tree-trunks, several of the great slabs composing
the wall had been displaced, leaving a passage.[135]

[135] H. B. Sterndale, _op. cit._ pp. 351 _sq._

What were these remarkable monuments? Mr. Sterndale believed the stone
chamber to be the tomb of some man of authority in ancient days, the
antiquity of the structure being vouched for by the great banyan-tree
which had so completely overgrown it. This view is likely enough, and is
confirmed by the large number of cairns about it, which appear to be
sepulchral. But what was the massive circular monument or platform,
built of huge blocks of lava laid in tiers? From Mr. Sterndale's
description it would seem that the structure closely resembled the tombs
of the sacred kings of Tonga, though these tombs are oblong instead of
circular. But they often supported a house or hut of wood and thatch;
and Mr. Sterndale may well be right in supposing that the circular
Samoan monument in li