Mysterious Relics.

Manawatu Standard, Volume 3, Issue 34, 5 January 1883, Page 3

Mysterious Relics.

According to a Home paper, the island of Rapa Nui owes its interest to its mysterious rejiosf of a forgotten race, who have utterly and completely died out even from legendary lore, while their handiwork abides, written on the rocks, which are so covered with carding as, to resemble the studio of some giant sculptor. Colossal stone images He half buried beneath the creeping grass and encroaching scrub. At intervals all found the coast there are . Cyclopean platforms from two hundred to thre<> hundred feet m length* and about thirty feet high, aud' built of hewn' stones five or six fefet lpng— and accurately fitted, without cement — and above these, on the headlands, are fArtificially levelled platforms paved "%xth Bquare blocks of black lavai On airtheße stone pedestals remain, whereon we^re placed the great images, which, by somo powerful force have mostly been thrown to the ground and broken The average height -of the figure is about 18 feet; some of those liing prostrate are 27 feet long, and measure 8 feet across the breast. You .can. infer - the size of the upright ones from the 'fact that so near : noon as 2 - p.m. they cast sufficient shadow to cover a party of thirty persons. Some have been found which measure 37 feet. They are all' hewn of « : close-grained grey lava, • which .is ;on}y .; found at Otouli, a crater, on-fche -eaat side of the island!" On a platform' hear this quarry several gigantic 3 images stand m perfect preservation. One of these measures 20 feet from the snouldpr to the crown ofi> the head. They represent an nn« known type. Very square face— short tljin upper lip, giving" a somewhat scornful expression — broad nose, and ears with pendant lobes. -All the facee look upward. The eyes are deeply sunken, and are supposed to have originally had eyeballs of obsidian. All the principal images have the top^of the head cut flat, and crowned with a cylindrical mass of red/lava, hewn perfectly, round. Some of theße crowns are sixby^six inches m diameter and fifty«two m height. The statues are literally lying about m hundreds, and the very rocks on the sea-beach are carved into strange forms— tortoises or human faces.