The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1896-12-16

good of the country, and seldom took
/ any exception to her convictions or
! her expressed opinions. She obtained
from President Dole the first interview
] that he had ever granted to the press.
! She investigated the sugar interest;
| she lectured for the benefit of kinder
garten and other local work. Affair." from
| the brilliant cosmopolitan life to which
! she had so long been accustomed, she
! entered with force and fervor into all
/ that made her advancement in Hawaii.
| Kate Field gave her life, literally, for
| Hawaii She had undertaken the clos
| est observations by going from island
/ to island, almost from house to house.
meeting and mingling with the natives
| and learning the absolute status of
their lives and progress. She has
! shown what a woman can do toward
| shaping public opinion and making the
! world better for her having lived in
! it," said Honolulu paper of her after
| the touching pathOs of her death.
| This last remarkable chapter of Kate
| Fields life was, indeed, one of supreme
| distinction and beauty. In the midst
! of her absorbing work, with hardly
| twenty-fOur hours of illness, she went
| out and on to the new life. The riddle
| of progress had always haunted her
eager mind All her life had been a
! quest Always had she Jared forth in
| search of news realms of thought and
purpose.
Sensitive to a fault her life was
| something of that spiritual tragedy
which results when such a spirit beats
against the adverse conditions of this
world. But she had, too, keen sense
| of humor and an infinite gift for seeing
| the funny side of things, and she was
| fortunate in always having a largeness
of outlook that left no room for undue
| dwelling on petty details. She was the
artist born, and both by gifts and grace
this temperament dominated her. Her
! culture was as exquisite as it was eX-
! tended, and her conversation was of
the choicest quality. A woman of mar
yellOus gifts, of the most generous and
noble nature, intense in energy, she
lived and died the life of a heroine.
| The wonderful Outpouring of love and
admiration for her by the people of
Hawaii was deeply impressive. She
was borne to the vault in the flower
heaped casket draped with the Stars
and Stripes-fit emblem for one with
whom patriotism was a passiOn-with
almost royal honors. The people
poured out lavish tributes of love and
respect to her whose whole life had
been service to truth and progress.
She believed in God and Immortality.
She was deeply interested in psychical
science. 81 am one of those who be-
lieve in the communion of the unseen, =
she wrote in a private letter within
few weeks of her death. Some years
ago she said to me during a conversa-
ton regarding the future life, Il look
to see science prove Immortality" The
remark was fraught with some thing of
that prophetic power with which a
certain temperamental force of insight
always invested her. That science
must and will prove immortality is
the message of today, for there is a
distinct and recognizable approach of
the two worlds, the seen and the I'M
seen, each of which is flashing it's sig
nails to the other. In the higher spirit
ualization of life here will be found
the conditions for communion with the
life beyond.
On that life have the eager mind, the
generous heart, the noble purposes that
informed the spirit of Kate Field en-
tered. She was always deeply inter
ested in psychical problems, and she
was one of the earliest eXperimenters
with planchette.l In 1868 she published
a little book entitled ''Planchette's
Diary in which she narrated her ex-
perience with it (the numerous mes
sages written through her hand being
of rather an unusual character), and
in this book she said:
L have no prejudice against a belief
in spiritual communion. If we are
endowed with immortal souls and pre-
serve an individuality in another eX-
istence. it seems to me natural, judg
ing by my own feeling of what [ should
be impeIled to do, that spirits should
desire to communicate with their
friends on earth. The Bible teens with
supernatural visitations, and if they
are possible at one time who shall say
they are impossible at anOther?'
This mental attitude was an ad-
vanced one at the time it was recorded:
with the subsequent development of
psychic science Miss Field kept always
in touch. The interest with which she
has entered on the life beyond is its
own consolation to those to whom her
companionship was so dear and her
personal presence one of perpetual
charm. Over her grave in Mount Au-
burn we may we'll lay the immOrtelles
of fame, the roses of live, the lilies of
eternal peace.
The world is the better, social prog
ress is the more advanced. and the
world of the unseen is nearer and
more real because of the life, of the in
finite energy, of the lofty purposes of
Kate Field.-The Arena.