Page:An account of the natives of the Tonga Islands.djvu/406

340 warriors. In the course of the following night, the enemy came down again, and made a de- sperate attack upon them : having resolved to burn the place to the ground, they had ap- pointed four hundred men to effect their pur- pose, each of whom was armed with a spear, and a lighted torch fixed at about a foot from the point of it. At a signal every man threw his flaming weapon at the fencing, or into the garrison, and, by the aid of this new invention, the place was set fire to, in several points at once. The besieged, with the view of render- ing themselves more secure, had removed all the draw-bridges over the dry ditch round the fencing, except one ; there was no ready means of escape, therefore, from the conflagration, which soon spread far and wide, except by one narrow path : hundreds consequently were compelled to leap into the ditch, the sides of which were too steep to climb. Among these was Teoo Cava, who, with several other great chiefs and warriors, managed to get out, by climbing up the backs of those whose fidelity prompted them to lend their superiors this friendly assistance at the utmost peril of their own lives. Teoo Cava, having thus got out of the ditch, was making the best of his way un- armed to Hihifo, when he was met by a native
 * of Fiji, belonging to the enemy's party, who