Highland recorder. (Monterey, Highland County, Va.) 1877-1972, 1909-02-26
TRIP TO THE ORIENT
Clarence e. Edwords Touring the
Eastern Countries.
he IS OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT.
INTERESTINGLY WRITTEN IN WEEK
LY LETTERS, WHICH WILL AP.
PEAR IN The RECORDER.

INTERESTINGLY w RITTEN IN w EEh-
LY LETTERS, WHICH WILL AP.
PEAR IN The RECORDER.
Nukaulofa, Tonga, September 23;
Eleven miles from Nukaulofa is
one of the strangest sights OF the
island. 1t is so extraordinary that
when | was told of it | declined to
believe, but now | have seen it. 1t
is called the grove of the bats, ="
and certainly is deserving of visit
from all who come this way. In
the grove are some thirty large
trees, and during the day each tree
is covered as thickly with flying
foxes, as a goosbery is with fruit.
These bats are about the size of
cat, with heavy, black fur, and
with heads exactly like those OF
foxes. They have hooks on the
ends of their wings, and all day
long they hang, head downward,
on the trees. At sunset they rise
in an immense cloud, countless
thousands of them, and fly away
over the island to devastate the
fruit trees. They are fruit eating
animals, and every plantation on
the island suffers from their ravages.
At sunrise they return to the grove
some of them having flown forty
miles during the night, and take
their place in serted ranks on the
trees The damage and loss they
cause on the island is simply cnor-
nous, but no one dare shoot or in
any way azure the bats, for they
are tabu, Sacred, andthc Tongans
believe that the kingdom wouldtait
| if the bats or the grove we're to be
destroyed.
Not far from the grove of the
bats is another strange thing, but
| it is strange from a different sense.
The place is called the burial place
of the TUT Tongans. They are sup
posed to be the last resting places
of an ancient sect, but these places
were built by a people who had a
better knowledge of mathematics
than is possessed by the natives.
They were built by a people who
had mechanical appliances now un-
known on the island, or anywhere
else in the South Seas. There are
two of these burial places, the larg-
er being about two thousand feet
square. Each consists of a double
terrace of large coral limestone
blocks, some of which measure
twenty feet long, five feet wide and
four feet thick. These immense
stones, weighing many tons, enclose
an oblong space which is now over
grown with bushes and weeds. The
/ terraces are of great antiquity, for
they are covered in many places
with gigantic forest trees. No one
! knows how old they are or by what
race they were constructed. They
are one of the unsolyed mysteries
of the Pacific ocean. | am of the
belief that the same people built
these burial places that built the
stone idol which told of in my let
tiers from Tahiti.
But even more mysterious and
more suggestive of a vanished race
is what is called the "Haamunga, "
situated about sixteen miles out OF
/ Nukaulofa. This consists of three
immense stones, one laid across the
top of the other two, which stand
upright. These upright stones are
about twenty feet above ground at
the top, and they stand about ten
feet apart. The upper stone is
smoothe and shaped, and lies in
two large sockets cut in the up
rights. From all appearances these
stones once formed a gateway, but
every trace of other building in the
vicinity has disappeared, and there
is nothing to show why or by whom
it was built. The natives rever-
ence the place, but they have no
legends regarding its origin.