Note 15 — Chapter IX · The Islands of the Blest

The Polynesians’ ghosts went westward. In their Paradise was a bread-fruit tree. “This tree had two branches, one towards the east and one towards the west, both of which were used by the ghosts. One was for leaping into eternal darkness into Po-pau-ole, the other was a meeting-place with the helpful gods.”15 Turner tells that “some of the South Sea Islanders have a tradition of a river in their imaginary world of spirits, called the ‘water of life’. It was supposed that if the aged, when they died, went and bathed there, they became young and returned to earth to live another life over again.”16 Yudhishthira, one of the heroes of the Aryo-Indian epic the Mahábhárata, becomes immortal after bathing in the celestial Ganges.17 In the Æneid, the hero sees souls in Paradise drinking of the water of Lethe so that they may forget the past and be reborn among men.