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And you were always so opposed to taboos when you were alive!" "To other people's," said the missionary. "Never to my own." "But yours have all proved wrong," said the convert. "It looks like it," said the missionary, "and I can't help that. No reason why I should break my word." "I never heard the like of this!" cried the daughter of Miru. "Pray, what do you expect to gain?"
By this the kava of the dead was ready, and the daughters of Miru began to intone in the old manner of singing. "Gone are the green islands and the bright sea, the sun and the moon and the forty million stars, and life and love and hope. Henceforth is no more, only to sit in the night and silence, and see your friends devoured; for life is a deceit, and the bandage is taken from your eyes."
"That is not the point," said the missionary. "I took this pledge for others, I am not going to break it for myself." The daughter of Miru was puzzled; she came and told her mother, and Miru was vexed; and they went and told Akaänga. "I don't know what to do about this," said Akaänga; and he came and reasoned with the missionary.
Now when the singing was done, one of the daughters came with the bowl. Desire of that kava rose in the missionary's bosom; he lusted for it like a swimmer for the land, or a bridegroom for his bride; and he reached out his hand, and took the bowl, and would have drunk. And then he remembered, and put it back. "Drink!" sang the daughter of Miru.
And there was Miru, ruddy in the glow of the ovens; and there sat her four daughters, and made the kava of the dead; and there sat the comers out of the islands of the living, dripping and lamenting. This was a dread place to reach for any of the sons of men.
By this the kava of the dead was ready, and the daughters of Miru began to intone in the old manner of singing: "Gone are the green islands and the bright sea, the sun and the moon and the forty million stars, and life and love and hope. Henceforth is no more, only to sit in the night and silence, and see your friends devoured; for life is a deceit, and the bandage is taken from your eyes."
Now the flaming of Akaänga's torch drew near in the night; and the misshapen hands groped in the meshes of the net; and they took the missionary between the finger and the thumb, and bore him dripping in the night and silence to the place of the ovens of Miru.
Now when the singing was done, one of the daughters came with the bowl. Desire of that kava rose in the missionary's bosom; he lusted for it like a swimmer for the land, or a bridegroom for his bride; and he reached out his hand, and took the bowl, and would have drunk. And then he remembered, and put it back. "Drink!" sang the daughter of Miru.
"But there is such a thing as right and wrong," said the missionary; "and your ovens cannot alter that." "Give the kava to the rest," said Akaanga to the daughters of Miru. "I must get rid of this sea-lawyer instantly, or worse will come of it." The next moment the missionary came up in the midst of the sea, and there before him were the palm trees of the island.
In particular, they warned him of the house of yellow reeds tied with black sinnet, how any one who touched it became instantly the prey of Akaanga, and was handed on to him by Miru the ruddy, and hocussed with the kava of the dead, and baked in the ovens and eaten by the eaters of the dead. "There is nothing in it," said the missionary.
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