The priests, in slaying
these sacrifices, were careful to mangle the bodies as little as
possible. From two to twenty were offered at once. They were laid
in a row with their faces downwards on the altar before the idol, to
whom they were presented in a kind of prayer by the priest, and, if
offerings of hogs were presented at the same time, these were piled
upon them, and the whole mass was left to putrify.
The only dwellings within the heiau were those of the priests, and
the "sacred house" of the king, in which he resided during the
seasons of strict Tabu. A doleful place this heiau is, haunted not
only by the memories of almost unimaginable terrors, but by the sore
thought that generations of Hawaiians lived and died in the
unutterable darkness of this ignorant worship, passing in long
procession from these grim rites into the presence of the Father
whose infinite compassions they had never known.
Every hundred feet of ascent from the rainless, fervid beach of
Kawaihae increased the freshness of the temperature, and rendered
exercise more delightful. From the fringe of palms along the coast
to the damp hills north of Waimea, a distance of ten miles, there is
not a tree or stream, though the scorched earth is deeply scored by
the rush of fierce temporary torrents.
Pages:
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269