The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1871-08-26

agricultural industry and get up a general revival
a return to the active habits and honest brow sweat
ing of the old feudal days. :,
7 am here cropped by an idea which first appeared
TO me twenty years ago amid the fumes Of an even
ing cigar, for the mere mention OF which ut the ume'
at a select philanthropical party was missed at IKE
any other disturber of geese,-but hold 70 II yet'-
viola When lands were distributed and the people
received from their large-hearted hing the gift OF
kuleanas, no conditions were appended ana a me
chance was lost. For had stipulation been maze,
each kuleana exacting from its recipient the lmpera,
tive cultivation of the glft,-that some crop shoutu
be grown, some trees planted, some industry pursued
tending to the owners profit and the welfare OF the
commonwealth ,-what harm? Who would have been
hurt? The assessors might have reported yearly and
the delinouenis or drones have been dealt with as IN
! the parable OF the talents. Alas such inspirations
were out Of order, or failed TO fall on the man whose
genius mapped our chart in those days The flood
tide WAS not taken.
How many cocoanut, date and palm groves of
tlrenty years growth might nOc be fringing with
wealth and beauty our desolate coasts How might
our exports have increased from the sheer instinct
i've and unreasoning obedience to law so characters
tic of the native,-how far might the population have
marked Plus to their possessions from the despotic
imposition of a profitable and pleasing employment?
Few of your readers need be told how those kuleana
gifts are scattered about. ike plums In the mlsers
pudding, seldom within hail of each other, no regard
being had to soil or climate or water or roads or har-
bors or health or any unitarian thing, but because
some ancestral bones lie here,-some ancient mat
'ron's midrift is buried there, some bit of sorcery was
enacted, some scamp ~begotten, some spotted pig
apotheosiZed, some remote high chief spit Tor worse)
upon the hallowed spot, some antique piece of ven
cradle barrenness found there her cure,-fOr such
/ or something similar the claim was made, registered
and accorded, and as Lord Byron enquired on a
similar occasion " Uhat has been the result Z"
Suppose that THESE sentimental souvenirs had been
disregarded, that q reservation had been made in
stead, in each district of a single spacious land, en-
tire in wood, kula and coast, near the best harbor to
N E1n-A n-1 H. IL 81 Hlan~A fllS Id A...
sent thither to settle. Perhaps two or possibly three
such lands in a district according to the population.
Then see Gas the seer says he saw) the smiling vii
lagos thus created, unity and strength and social life,
the village church and school house, the market, the
mill and the village green, p~erchance for vagabonds
the stocks. Fancy our village at eventide when the
young of everything comes forth to play and the
men are returning from the field and women are
knitting at their cottage doors, whilst you hear the
hum of the spinning wheel inside and the cows ard
pigs and poultry ere returning from thei aFe
common where trespass and its p-ea-lties aa~
known,-walk through the cottage g1~den aad from
some rising mound look down over long sweeps Of
green, the kalo and potatoe field, and beyond, the
general farm, united fabor's work and produce Of
associated hands, and there behold the resources of
the country and ask the melancholy question " might
not such things have been p
Here is what there is al ugly church on n windy
hill. "a piety trap, whose uses are looking obsOlete) a
shabby school house silent and seedy, to which little
and big boys and girls must toll their weary or
IEiuShty WY hiOuS Huu III Edih vi tOiilhS SUI
for miles-an old woman picking feas from something
on her lap, apparently the last of her species dismissed
by DR.. Darwin,-ten square feet of kalo and a barren
fig tree on a two thousand acre lot unOccupied, two
feeble old men backing hulis three ~strapping young
bucks in yellow ornaments, ~galloping marvellous
horses to a feast and dance 20 miles of a poor fam
lily holding an umbrella over their prize hog who has
resolved to travel no farther ut present and twenty
seven sore-backed horses. tethered for Saturdays
racing and Sundays reunion. Such is a district on
Hawaii, (ivelier in this grouping than in reality,
for these incidentals occupy 80 miles Of aupuni road)
and once every two years it commits a member to
Parliament.
The stranger comes, but a few sunny days from
his own model republic, from pickles and peppers to
lotus eating, from the hustle and noise of politics and
commerce where it is a sin to stand still, from rapid
thinking to lazy dreaming, from the 9" Cosmopolitan -
to John Willet's g Maypole," and find the veritable
old John himself softly whistling vespers in his door
way or Dramatically repudiating the last idea left
with him by his last visitor some weeks since. Such
contrasts strike u stranger, but we must not adopt
his speculations on pains of being sent to Coventry.