Note 6 — PREFACE. (continued 4)

When Moikeha saw that his sons were excited and were so worked up that there was much contention among them, he devised a way of giving them a test at something, to determine who should go to Tahiti. Upon deciding what the nature of the test was to be, he called his sons to him and said: “I have decided to give you a test, and the boy who shall excel over the others, he shall be the one to go and bring your brother.” He then took the boys to the river in the order of their birth. But before this he told his sons: “Let each of you bring his ti-leaf canoe6 and sail it across the river, each one to have but one trial, and under no condition are you to have a second trial. The one whose canoe shall come between my thighs, that boy shall be the one to go and bring your brother.”