CHAPTER LVII.
Taji Takes Counsel With Himself My brief intercourse with our host, had by this time enabled me to form a pretty good notion of the light, in which I was held by him and his more intelligent subjects.
His free and easy carriage evinced, that though acknowledging my assumptions, he was no way overawed by them; treating me as familiarly, indeed, as if I were a mere mortal, one of the abject generation of mushrooms.
The scene in the temple, however, had done much toward explaining this demeanor of his.

A demi-god in his own proper person, my claims to a similar dignity neither struck him with wonder, nor lessened his good opinion of himself.
As for any thing foreign in my aspect, and my ignorance of Mardian customs---all this, instead of begetting a doubt unfavorable to my pretensions, but strengthened the conviction of them as verities.
Thus has it been in similar instances; but to a much greater extent.
The celebrated navigator referred to in a preceding chapter, was hailed by the Hawaiians as one of their demi-gods, returned to earth, after a wide tour of the universe.

And they worshiped him as such, though incessantly he was interrogating them, as to who under the sun his worshipers were; how their ancestors came on the island; and whether they would have the kindness to provide his followers with plenty of pork during his stay.
But a word or two concerning the idols in the shrine at Odo.

Superadded to the homage rendered him as a temporal prince, Media was there worshiped as a spiritual being.

In his corporeal absence, his effigy receiving all oblations intended for him.