The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-01-10
TAHITIAN FIRE WALKERS.
ONE OF THEM IN HONOLULU TO
 PERFORM THE MIR1CLE.
Writers Who Assert That the Perfor- nance Is Genuine and Iuexpltcable- Descriptions by Persons Who Have Witnessed IT.

The kahunas of Hawaii may look well to their laurels, to see that their honors be not snatched from them, for from Tahiti, across the sea- has come an aged sorcerer with new kind of mag ic, and yet not new for the mystic se- cret of Papa Ita has been handed down
 to him from his fathers. It was a se- cret, Papa Ita says, that was wrested from nature hundreds of years ago by his ancestors, and which has been held sacred by his forefathers through the cycles of time, to be given from
 father to son as a precious heritage, through an honored line of the chosen few.
 Papa Ita is the last of the chosen few, and he is bartering the secret for the price of his daily pottage. This is how it happens that the old man, bent un- der his weight of threescore years, and Drowned to ten-fold browner tinge than the day he was born by the suns of sixty Tahitian summers, will defy the clements and set aside the laws of nature in public exhibition for the ben eft of Honolulu citizens some time during the coming week.
 flow it is done, or what the sechet dT its accomplishment, no one has ever been able to say but reliable authori- ties state that there is nothing of the fake element about the performance. It is an undeniable fact that the fire walkers do here walk on fire, and if by other means than the power given them through the spirits which they summon with their ti-leaf wands, peo- pie who have witnessed the ceremony have been unable, even by the keenest observation and closest study, to dis cover what.
 On the island of Maritius the fire walking ceremony is a part of the an- nual festival, and is performed every year. Fire walking has been referred to by writers on the subject as "The Maritius Miracle" and it is a matter of record that at one time the governor of the Fiji Islands, hearing that some of his guests were incredulous, caused the ceremony to be performed for the vice. regal party, before about five hundred native spectators
 The Polynesian society have given much attention to the question recently
  number contains an interesting article on the subject written by Miss Teuira Henry of Kukui street. this city. Miss Henry was herself born in Tahiti and lived there a number of years, and her article aroused much comment from able writers and people who had been eye witnesses of the ceremony. Miss Henry gives full account of the per formance, with translation of the in- cantat tions accompanying the feast. According to her account the fire walk ing is ceremony that goes with the feast of ti-root, performed when the huge oven is made ready for the bak- ing of the feast
 In an excavation some thirty feet across both ways, logs and sticks are piled, and the stones are placed on top. The logs are then set fire underneath, and within a period of twenty-four hours have burned low, leaving the stones at white heat, ready for the bak- ing of the ti-root feast. It is then that the sorcerer calls upon his spirits, sum- moning them with his ti-leaf wand, and calling upon them in the chant of in- cantation
 "Ol, spirits who heated the oven! Let it die out! Oh, dark earthworms; oh, light earthworms! Fresh water and salt water heat of the oven, and redness of the oven, hold up the foot steps of the walkers, and fan the heat of the bed; oh, cold beings! Let us lie in the midst of the oven! Oh, Great Woman who sets fire to the skies! Hold the fan, and let us go into the oven for little while"
 Still chanting, the leader steps into the oven and walks over the stones followed by the people who are to par take of the feast, waving the wand and circling about over the stones without burn or pain.
 The "Great woman who sets fire to the skies is the leading spirit of the fire walkers, and to her is attributed the possession of the dread lightning and thunderbolt.
 Miss Henry does not attempt to ex plain the miraculous performance, but leaves the solution of the surprising feat to scientists. Her statement is merely the statement of an eyewitness.
 A MT. Hastwell, in a San Francisco gives the following account:
 'The natives of Relatea have some performances so entirely out of the or dinary course of events as to institute inquiry as to proper solution. On Sep tember 20, 1885, witnessed the wonder I ful and to me inexplicable performance | of passing through the fiery furnace The furnace that l saw was an exca- ! walton of three or four feet in the | ground, of circular form, sloping up- | ward, and about thirty feet across. ! The excavation was filled with logs and i wood and then covered with large | stones. A fire was built underneath and kept burning for about a day. l When I witnessed it, on the second day, l the flames were pouring up through in- f terstices of the rocks, which were heat ed to a red and white heat.
 1T am entirely satisfied that this fire walking is no fraud perpetrated by pro- feesional people. In the first place there can be absolutely no unworthy l motive for so many people of different [ castes and families combining together for such a dangerous performance as this Besides, people of all ages from eight to seventy and more take part in It. a circumstance which makes q com- bination of the kind at all events inn probable, if not impossible"
 Another writer refers to fire-wallSing as the "Raiatean Ceremony having closely studied the performances at