"If Tu-Kila-Kila chooses," he went on, tapping his chest with conscious pride, "he can knock these bones together--so--and bid them live again.

Is it not I who cause women and beasts to bring forth their young?
Is it not I who give the turtles their increase?
And is it not a small thing to me, therefore, whether the sea tosses up my victims from my home in the sun, or whether it does not?
Let us leave them alone on the reef for to-night; to-morrow we will send over our canoes to fetch them." It was all pure brag, all pure guesswork; and yet, Tu-Kila-Kila himself profoundly believed it.
As he spoke, the light from Felix's fire blazed out against the dark sky, stronger and clearer still; and through that cloudless tropical air the figure of a man, standing for one moment between the flames and the lagoon, became distinctly visible to the keen and practised eyes of the savages.

"I see them?
I see them; I see the victims!" the foremost worshipper exclaimed, rushing forward a little at the sight, and beside himself with superstitious awe and surprise at Tu-Kila-Kila's presence.
"Surely our god is great! He knows all things! He brings us meat from the setting sun, in ships of fire, in blazing canoes, across the golden road of the sun-bathed ocean!" As for Tu-Kila-Kila himself, leaning on his elbow at ease, he gazed across at the unexpected sight with very languid interest.

He was a god, and he liked to see things conducted with proper decorum.

This crowing and crying over a couple of spirits--mere ordinary spirits come ashore from the sun in a fiery boat--struck his godship as little short of childish.