Page:An account of the natives of the Tonga Islands.djvu/261

Rh of urging any thing against him, and he solemnly declaring his innocence, and stating that his son must have invented this tale to answer some purpose with the enemy; moreover, having always borne a good character and been well beloved by his men, and believed to have been always firmly attached to the interests of Finow, he was set at liberty and restored to his post.

The day after this chief was reinstated, Finow ordered the ceremony of drinking cava to the priest of his tutelar god Toobó Totai, by way of gratitude for the late victory. This ceremony is exactly the same as that of invoking a god through the medium of his priest; and consists merely in the customary form of sitting down to make cava in the presence of a priest, (he presiding at the head of the ring). In this instance, after the cava, pork, &c. had been served out, one of the matabooles, in a few words, thanked the god in the person of the priest for the late signal victories. The priest in answer, after waiting for another dish of cava, declared that Finow would at length succeed in his war against Felletoa, but that this fortress was not the strongest power he had to contend with, for the seeds of insurrection were already sown in his own army, and although Lioofau was perfectly innocent of what had been