This bundle of weird stories sprang from the burial and the woman's selfish conjuration.I was dissatisfied with what I heard,harped upon questions,and struck at last this vein of metal.It is from sundown to about four in the morning that the kinsfolk camp upon the grave;and these are the hours of the spirits'wanderings.At any time of the night -it may be earlier,it may be later -a sound is to be heard below,which is the noise of his liberation;at four sharp,another and a louder marks the instant of the re-imprisonment;between-whiles,he goes his malignant rounds.'Did you ever see an evil spirit?'was once asked of a Paumotuan.
'Once.''Under what form?''It was in the form of a crane.''And how did you know that crane to be a spirit?'was asked.'I will tell you,'he answered;and this was the purport of his inconclusive narrative.His father had been dead nearly a fortnight;others had wearied of the watch;and as the sun was setting,he found himself by the grave alone.It was not yet dark,rather the hour of the afterglow,when he was aware of a snow-white crane upon the coral mound;presently more cranes came,some white,some black;then the cranes vanished,and he saw in their place a white cat,to which there was silently joined a great company of cats of every hue conceivable;then these also disappeared,and he was left astonished.
This was an anodyne appearance.Take instead the experience of Rua-a-mariterangi on the isle of Katiu.He had a need for some pandanus,and crossed the isle to the sea-beach,where it chiefly flourishes.The day was still,and Rua was surprised to hear a crashing sound among the thickets,and then the fall of a considerable tree.Here must be some one building a canoe;and he entered the margin of the wood to find and pass the time of day with this chance neighbour.The crashing sounded more at hand;and then he was aware of something drawing swiftly near among the tree-tops.It swung by its heels downward,like an ape,so that its hands were free for murder;it depended safely by the slightest twigs;the speed of its coming was incredible;and soon Rua recognised it for a corpse,horrible with age,its bowels hanging as it came.Prayer was the weapon of Christian in the Valley of the Shadow,and it is to prayer that Rua-a-mariterangi attributes his escape.No merely human expedition had availed.