Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1858-02-01
SATURDAY AFTERNOON THE SAND
WITCH ISLAND

Saturday afternoon is a feature of Honolulu
life seldom met with in any other place. Bus-
ness Of most kinds is closed for the week at four
clock, and mechanics and laborers receive
their wages. We do not know Of any other
place where this practice prevails so universally
as here, to the mutual satisfaction and advan-
tage, it may be observed, of the employer and
the employed. "A chapter might be written
upon the moral good which is calculated to re-
suit from this practice, but we set out to de-
scribe the afternoon itself, rs it is seen in the
streets of Honolulu after o'clock
With the native portion of our population the
grand idea seems to be to have ride and
mounted on horses. mules and jack asses sad
died and bareback, bridled or tethered they
gallOp off, up one street and down another
whlsking round corners and giving the pedes
TRANS hair-breath escapes. If we stand still mt
the corner OF Nuuanu and King streets for half
an hour. we will see the same parties ride by
three or four times, having made the circuit of
the town, and always at the same headong
pace, making it dangerous to cross the street,
unless one is possessed of the faculty of looking
two ways at once. In a very short space of
time we shall here count a thousand hOrsemcn
and women. One would imagine il would be
much pleasanter riding out on the plains of
Waikiki or at kalihi, where the air is fresh and
free from dust. But our Hawaians ride to be
seen and to show their hOrsemanship, and there
are no spectators out of town; so they continue
bright-colored robes, sitting astride like the
males, and managing their horses for the most
part with energy and skill, until the shades of
evening put end to their sport, or at some
unlucky moment they halt when their bride
is seized by lynx-eyed native policeman, and
they finish one week and begin the other in the
cells of the station-hOuse, unless some Blaka-
DsGkG friend) stcrs forward and liberates them
by the payment of six dollars. 1t has always
been matter of astonishment that so few acci-
dents occur on these occasions.
Here comes group of mechanics with toll
stained clothes, but pleasant faces, jngling the
dollars in their pockets They are English
men and Americans, and in point of intell-
genee are good specimens of ADglo-Saxons.
How many of them will withstand the tempta-
tions of q Saturday night in Honolulu and
wake up in the morning miNUs headache and
Plus their wages, is quite another thing. Places
of resort for intellectual improvement. such as
reading room, or a lyceum, circulating
library are much needed for there is literally
no society of an elevating nature for this class
in Honolulu, and The only alternative which
many think remains for them is an unpleasant
one to contemplate.
YOnder whirls a merchant with his Boston
or New York turnout and his imported nag
He's weeks work too, is done, and bidding
sdieu for a time to whaler's bills and 10 per
cSHtS. he goes to breathe the free air of Nuua
nu OF the plains. With skill he avoids a COLI
siOns In these crowded streets where every
body is on the rush Here are sailors out of
their proper element, and full of an improper
one, with feet well home in the stirrup, both
hands holding on to the pommel of the saddle
as though 1T was the tiller OF the horse, while
the latter goes blundering and shying about
everywhere. There a jabbering Chinaman
with hand-cart: won't get out of the way; old
native woman leading her pig with the rope
stretching half across the street vehicle com
ing along, and ictU turn the wrong way; dust
flying SO thick you cannot see !; these are some
ot the incidents in a Saturday afternoons ride
in Honolulu. A few years ago there might
have been added to this list an occasional wild
bullock. escaped from the laSso, with tail on
end, madly cavOrting along the streets, while
humanity incOntinenty scattered before him
but one Saturday a man was gOred to death
and the driver tried for manslaughter, and that
kind of sport was stopped.
There stands a crowd of seamen, landsmen
and nondeScripts. ali in animated discussion
with ordinary powers of imag gnatiOn you may
get from this crowd good idea of what oc-
Cured few thousand years ago at the Tower
OF Babel Livery nation that you can readily
call to mind, and others that are not nameless
IN history, are here represented. We doubt if
the Apostles had a better field on which to dis
play thelr gift of languages on the day of
PentecOst." Stolid-looking Hindoo i, cheek
byJowl with the gesticulating Frenchman-
swarthy Spaniard jostles the air-haired Ger
man-pigmy Malay is overshadowed by the
huge African-iDquisitive Yankee confronts
the cat-eyed Chinaman-j jaunty ChilenO and
blubber-lOgged dRussian-duIcet-toned TahitIan
and cultural administrations Briton and
not at all fastidious HawaIian-chldreu of the
sunny south and of the frozen north-sons of
the old and wOrn-out east, and of the young
and vigorous west black spirits and white.
red spirits and gray" all mingle together and
form the singular element of a Saturday after
noon in Honolulu.-PaciGc Adrertiser