Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. InfanticideMr "Williams' experiencesModes of infanticideMotivesThe AreoisExtirpation of the practiceThe children's festival at RaiateaSecond despatch of the DufFailure of the enterpriseArrival of the Nautilus in Matavai BayIll- usage of the missionariesDisruption of the partyEvil influence of European seamenSingular mode of baptismThe missionaries' letter to the SocietyCritical positionAssassination of the high priestMurder of Mr Lewis. At the commencement of 1798 the missionaries had a public conference with the king, his father, and other influential personages, at which they explained, through the medium of Peter the Swede, that their object in settling at Tahiti was not only to teach the inhabitants to read and write, and instruct them in the craft of the carpenter and the blacksmith, but to give them the knowledge of divine truth, to wean them from the worship of false gods, and to show them the way to eternal happiness. In return for the benefits they were eager to confer, they implored the Tahitians to desist from human sacrifices and the destruction of infants. To render acquiescence with the latter demand more easy, they undertook to build a house for the reception of the children that should be spared, and to rear and educate them with as much care and attention as they bestowed upon their own offspring. Without accepting this benevolent offer, the chiefs at once promised that infanticide should cease, and admitted that it was a practice which could not be defended. No steps, however, were taken to insure the fulfilment of the promise, and their children continued to perish until Christianity was recognised as the only true religion. Again and again did the missionaries entreat parents to confide to their tenderness the expected babe, ...