the work he was about, the atua (divinity) would certainly punish his impious contempt, by getting into his stomach before his time, and eating him out of the world. Of this premature destiny he seemed so apprehensive that he kept his hands as though they were never made for touching any article of diet; nor did he suffer them by even a single motion to show the least sympathy for his mouth, while that organ was obliged to use double exertions, and act for those members which superstition had paralysed. “Sitting down by the side of this deluded being, whom credulity and ignorance had rendered hopeless,” says Nicholas, “I under took to feed him; and his appetite being quite voracious, I could hardly supply it as fast as he devoured. Without ever consulting his digestive powers, of which we cannot suppose he had any idea, he spared himself the trouble of mastication; and, to lose no time, swallowed down every lump as I put it into his mouth: and I speak within compass when I assert that he consumed more food than would have served any two ploughmen in England. “Perfectly tired of administering to his insatiable gluttony, which was still as ravenous as when he commenced, I now wished for a little intermission; and taking advantage of his situation, I resolved to give him as much to do as would employ him for at least a few