To convince the people of the absurdity of their apprehensions, the teachers, as soon as the idol was converted into ashes, roasted some bananas upon them, of which they ate, and invited the spectators to partake. None however were brave enough to admit so dangerous a morsel into their mouths, and they waited, open-eyed, for the expected result of the profane audacity of the two teachers. But, like the inhabitants of Melita, "after they had looked a great while and saw no harm come to them, they changed their minds," and in less than ten days after this event no fewer than fourteen idols were destroyed. Soon afterwards, the chief Tinomana sent for the missionaries, and on their arrival at his mountain-home, informed them that after much deliberation, he had resolved to become a Christian, and to place himself under their direction. He therefore wished to know what was the first step he ought to take. They informed him that he must destroy his maraes and burn his idols; to which he immediately replied, "Come with me and see them destroyed." On reaching the place he desired some person to take a firebrand and set fire to the temple, the _ataraw_, or altar, and the _unus_, or sacred pieces of carved wood by which the marae was decorated. Four huge idols were then deposited at the feet of the teachers, who, having read a portion of the tenth chapter of S. Luke's Gospel, which was peculiarly appropriate, especially from verse 17 to 20, stripped them of their linen wrappings, which they distributed among the people, and threw them into the flames.
Some of the spectators waxed wroth with the chief, and expressed themselves with great violence, denouncing him as a fool and a madman for burning his gods, and listening to worthless fellows who "were drift-wood from the sea, washed on shore by the waves of the ocean." The women were specially vehement in their grief, and broke out into the loudest and dolefulest lamentations imaginable. Many of them inflicted deep gashes on their heads with sharp shells and shark's teeth, and ran wildly to and fro, smeared with the blood which streamed from their wounds, and crying in tones of the deepest melancholy, "Alas, alas, the gods of the madman Tinomana, the gods of the insane chief are given to the flames!" Others, blackened with charcoal, were not less demonstrative.