heir upper surface, were the most striking and
characteristic feature of the _morais_; indeed the name _morai_ or
_marae_ appears to have been sometimes confined, at least by European
observers, to the pyramid. In front of the pyramid the images were kept
and the altars fixed. The houses of the priests and of the keepers of
the idols were erected within the enclosure.[105] Of these interesting
monuments, which seemed destined to last for ages, only a few
insignificant ruins survive; the rest have been destroyed, chiefly at
the instigation of the missionaries.[106]

[105] W. Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, i. 339 _sqq._ Compare
J. Cook, _Voyages_, i. 157 _sqq._, 217, 219, 220, 222, vi. 37,
_sq._, 41; J. R. Forster, _Observations made during a Voyage
round the World_, pp. 543 _sqq._; G. Forster, _Voyage round the
World_, i. 267, ii. 138 _sq._; J. Wilson, _op. cit._ pp. 207
_sq._, 211 _sq._; D. Tyerman and G. Bennet, _op. cit._ i. 267
_sq._, 271, 280 _sqq._, 549, ii. 13 _sq._; J. A. Moerenhout,
_op. cit._ i. 466-470; A. Baessler, _Neue Suedsee-Bilder_, pp.
111 _sqq._; S. and K. Routledge, "Notes on some Archaeological
Remains in the Society and Austral Islands," _Journal of the
Royal Anthropological Institute_, li. (1921) 438 _sqq._
According to J. R. Forster (_l.c._), the _marais_ (_morais,
maraes_) "consist of a very large pile of stones, generally in
the shape of an Egyptian pyramid, with large steps; sometimes
this pyramid makes one of the sides of an area, walled in with
square stones and paved with flat stones: the pyramid is not
solid, but the inside is filled with smaller fragments of coral
stones."

[106] A. Baessler, _Neue Suedsee-Bilder_, p. 135. This writer has
given us a survey and description of some of the principal
remains which existed at the end of the nineteenth century (pp.
111-148). The ruins of two _maraes_ in the island of Moorea are
described by Mr. and Mrs. Routledge (_l.c._). In one of them the
pyramid stood at the western end of the enclosure, and in the
other at the eastern end.

Some of the pyramids erected within these sacred enclosures were of
great size. In Tahiti an enormous one was seen and described by Captain
Cook as well as by later observers. It was of oblong shape and measured
two hundred and sixty-seven feet in length by eighty-seven feet in
width. It rose in a series of eleven ste