The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1901-11-27
ROLLIN N. DAGGETT.

for he went alone, a gun on his shoulder
: and a stout heart under his jacket;
= and as for most of the other informa-
e ton touching his anteceds nts. his career
in the West and his public life 1t falls
far short of the narrative which
t truthful history of the men who built
: the West would attach to his name.
: Mr.. Daggett, whose right to an ex-
: tended biography in a Honolulu paper
is derived from the fact that he was
once United States Minister here. came
. Of parentage which was American in
the widest chronological sense. His |
white ancestors were all Anglo-SaXons ,
long resident in the New World; his
ancestors of color were Indians of the /
old Massachusetts tribes with whom T
the Puritans fought. From the civil [
lied lineage he drew qualities of mind .
that made him a poet. a philosopher !
and man of learning; from the abort I
ginal stock came strain of half bar
barrie fancy, a taste for primitive pleas
ures and an attitude of sheer defiance
of conventional life and speech.
! One was reminded-yes, it is true,-Of
Tennyson himself in this Daggett of the
pen and of the mining camps. AT col
lege long ago an English lecturer told
of having sat next to the laureate at
wine. thinking of the exquisite fancy of
the man and of those Jewels five words
long that on the stretched forefnger of
all time. sparkle forever" A story of
Armenian savagery was being told to T
which the laureate listened with a t
frowning brow. When the sad tale t
ended he who had whispered the secret e
of the tiny shell was heard to say with [
a savage grunt: 1.-The fellow ought to q
have had his own belly ripped up"
And so when one began to feel the
exquisite pathos of Daggett's poem
My Christmas Guests poem which 7
Frank Pixley printed in the Argonaut
every year; or the sublimity of his p
treatise on the ghost in Hamlet, the u
ghost whom he called an "armored o.
shade;" of the languorous charm of his =
Waikiki where -
The cocoa, with its crest of spears, pl
Keeps watch beside the crescent shore. tc
1t was then that Daggett would L
startle his admirer with an outburst III
such as might be heard through the
open door of a miners rum shop just as al
the nightly row was beginning. e.
The story of his march across the III
plains shows better than any other 50
known chapter of his life the mixed
of this singular but low
lbIe man. When he determined to leave
mis- New York home and seek his for We
tune in the California mines, he dis 90
lained the protection of anybody else. -
He knew as well as did Mowgli of the GO
Hipling tale that a clear head and off
brave heart would carry one long way ia
through the jungle. So with his gun as ra
lis companion he started West, avoid La
ng all companions until he passed the Hi
Rockies. 1t was a time when cholera or
vas decimating the ranks Of the Aol
pioneers and young Daggett fell i'll of p ~,
What he thought was the dreaded 80
nalady. Seeing a camp in the distance off
lie went to it and found that there were St
many sick people. A rough team WI
'ter told the lad that he had the
.holera and that he had better crawl
Inder a wagon and die.
Got any pain-kiler?" asked the
-outh. We
The teamster said he had. or
Hand it out" %
Daggett got the remedy and drinking ca,
cupful went under the wagon. Gle
Have you got any friends you want CT
otified?" asked the teamster. ri,
Go to --" was the unexpected re- titr
ort. I'm going to get WELL Ne
And get well he did. In a few days wo
e left the camp and again struck out 90,
pr himseh. 1t was not long before he moi
)und a wagon to which was attached o,c
COW. Within the rough vehicle We're Civ
vo little girls crying dismalIy; with
ut were the dead bodies of the father I
nd mother. Dasgett buried the dead.
'ok the little ones in charge and led co
he harnessed coW-her drawing mate eul
cling a heap of gnawed bones on the All
ains behind-along the Western trail cor
hree nights later a runaway OK stray He
! into camp and the young argonaut Gee
,on had 1T "hitched up with the cow. of
nd in that fashion the little party, cha
ercifully preserved on the way, reach 10
Suffers fort. The orphans found in W.
ollin NJ. Daggett a father who cared T,oy
IT them until they were able to care All
IT themselves. But the story would adv
)t be complete or characteristic II we liev
ave out the fate of the OK AT SUIT Ila
RS fort the beast was put in corral -
nd never again seen by it's owner. -
or would any one else confess to hav-
g seen it. IT believe" said Mr.. Dag
TT in after years, that it was ghost
< sent by God Almighty to help me
I'VE those children
How Mr.. Daggett started the first
-erary magazine on the Pacific coast,
lie Golden Era, a publication which,
1t four years ago, was merged with 1
lie Western Journal of Education; how
: became editor of the Virginia City
nronicle in the great days of the Com
ock Lode; how he reused Congress by
thrilling speech on one of the vital
Iestions of the day, gaining thereby i
iragraph of praise in James C. II
lanes book of Congressional recollec- =
0ns;-all these are tales We have no -
om TO print. Near the close of his
lblic career he came to Hawaii as
mister Plenipotentiary and perhaps
one who ever rested here save
narles Warren Stoddard and Robert
1uis Stevenson, showed a deeper
'etic sympathy with things Hawaiian.
is verses on Waikiki, written while
ting in the lanai at Sans Souci, make
e sweetest of all island songs. 1t was
and not King Kalakaua. who wrote