The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1882-04-15
AINOKEA.
a jolly Trip on Maui,

1t is astonishing how quickly 'roughing IT
together makes strangers into friends ant
melts chilling etiquette and freezing, distan
pol,teness into familiar intercourse.
1t was 80 with us. When we started up TIT
side of ola Haeakaa and spent our first nigh
at Oinda, the mountain retreat OF MIR. A., WI
were comparative strangers. We addressed
each other as Mr.. Brown, Miss Smith, Mrs
Jones, SC. After the first two days this wa
modified by proposition to address each othel
by the second Christian name, and we tried tc
call each other Mary, Leopold, Henry, Archi
bald, Warner, Arnold and Cowels. After an
other days experience Mary developed into
Polly, Archibald degenerated into Sally Ann
Warner into Sukey, and Arnold was dubbed
Mother Prudence, and if she scolded too much
Mother Grump The boys kept their second
names to the end of the trip.
The first days experience was rather dis
heartening to party on pleasure trip. II
was slow horseback ride through drizzling
rain from Oinda to the summit, ten miles
But guides got started so far ahead of us tina,
we lost them, and CROPPED our way up through
the fog and rain until nearly dark, when we
stumbled upon them at the edge of the crater
We found plenty of bunch grass for our AMI
mails, and water not far off, and all hands sci
to raise the tent. Soon cup of hot coffee
concocied by Mother p, put us in good hui
NOR, and the mist cleared long enough for us
to have view OF 1.-THE house Of the sun" be-
fore dark. II was grand and desolate; an
immense bowl of dead ashes and decomposing
lava several miles across, evidences Of the
belching forth of the giant volcano ages ago
when that 90 square miles OF what Is desOla
ton now was lake of fire and birthstone.
never tire of looking at it, although this Is my
ninth visit. The bottom OF the crater is about
5000 feet below us, and from the giddy edge
on which our tent 10 pitched the cones, some
of them SIX hundred feet high, look like musk
rat hills, and the trees that dot the crater on
the side nearest US appear no larger than sage
brush. I; was grand fun lOosenlng the largest
stones we could handle and watch them 60
laundering down the inside, making immense
jumps of hundreds of feet and waking the
echoes of the old mountain glorlously Mark
Twain has so we'll described the view that !
will let you read it in "koughing It," and con
fine myself to our personal experiences. The
curtain was stretched in the tent early, for we
were all tired The four girls (fOr Mother
Gru.np was girl for the time) arranged their
beds on one side, while we boys moved the
eatables and culinary apparatus so as to make
room for our three beds on our side. Lights
were out, and slumber stealing over US, when
q scream from the ladies' side brought us to
our feet prepared to rush to the rescue. "Noth.
ing fercer than goats inhabit these wilds, so il
can't be beast that is devouring them,'
Quoth Cowles, cropping around in the dark tor
some of his fixtures. "A centipeder was the
next cry from the ladies. probably" smiled
Henry, as he coiled himself down under the
bedclothes and awaited further developments
A centipede 10000 feet above the sea would
have been an anomaly. Hold on minnie
and I'll come over and kill i'll" shouted Leo
pold, stralning at one of his wet boots. "Why
Miss smith," said another voice on the femln
inc side, "that isn't centipede; its my breast
pin that pinned to the tent" And so 1t was
We had good laugh at her expense, and lay
awake two hours longer talking about it.
The moonlight was making the tent quite
light now, and some one suggested that the
crater must look grand by moonlight. "Oh,
yes, want to see the crater by moonlight"
said she of centipede fame; and encouraged
by the rest who didn't offer to leave their
warm nests, however, to see her see it, up she
got and sailed forth. She came shiverlng
back in less than minute with the report that
dense fog covered everything, and she was
nearly frozen. More fun for the rest of us,
and more lying awake The beds were very
hard, for we were above the fern line some
thousands of feet and had to sleep on the hard
ground. AT last everybody got quiet at once,
and we slept more or less till morning.
Mother Prudence did not seem to feel at all
enthusiastic next morning, so we boys made
the coffee and got breakfast. The hobbled
mules were very FESTIVE, and made Us fun by
their comic jumps in their efforts to disentan-
gle their feet. We had now come as far as
parties usually 60 and the next natural thing
to do was to go into ecstacIes over the crater,
and then turn around and 60 down to clvlliza-
zion again. But We had other plans We
we're going to venture down into the bottom of
the crater, and after viewing it at leisure, find
our way out of one Of the immense gaps
through which the lava used to pour-and go
down to the sea on the opposite side of the
mountain Only one of the party 0he patri-
archal "Henry'D had ever done it; but we had
two guides who knew the road, plenty of grub,
a good tent and several good pack mules. A
trail led down the cliff at our feet, but the
guides pronounced the descent with the heavl-