The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1901-02-05
OLD TINES
IN KAILUA
Continued from Page 81


the oh-oh-especially the wooden one
But a Hawaiian preferred to dig on his
launches.
There was a white blacksmith named
Rice located in Kailua, who must have
done a considerable business in hammer
ing out o-os and bending plane-irons for
the natives. Mr. Rice was. like nearly
all the inconsistency whites of those
days, of irregular habits and naturally
hostile to the missionaries, whose efforts
tended to restrict immoralities. Poor
Rice suffered in his own family re-
member to have heard, without under
standing what it meant, that Rice had a
terrible time in the elopement of his
young half-white daughter. He vainly
searched for her on the premises of
white trader, who, as he soon after
learned, had her headed up inside of
cask in his shed. Such an escapade,
however, in those days carried with it
no loss of character to a damsel in any
native community. Her only inconve-
nience would be the fiogging her irate
white parent administered We were all
pleased to- hear not long after we left
Kailua that Mr.. Rice had become con-
verted and an earnest Christian, under
the ministrations of Father Thurston,
who had himself, like DR.. Lyman Beech
er, been a blacksmith. Doubtless the
anvil is as favorable to breeding mis-
iSiOlldilcS DIS was Tic Saw ana plane III
Nazareth, or the net at Bethsaida.
The natives, by the way, wove admir-
able nets from the splendid olona fiber,
which they stained dark brown with ku-
kui juice. The sinkers were pebbles the
floats of wiliwili wood. Much fishing
was accomplished with both seine and
hook. The ancient bone hooks had dis
appeared. Steel fish hooks were lead
| ing article of trade. The fishermen very
1Yr1n Y1Ju ref lior Of
hook which they filed out themselves
from large needles; it was without barb,
the point being bent to one side and
curved inward. The fisherman's craft
was one of great skill and special knowl-
edge. Canoes of all sizes were constant
| ly seen on the sea, often going out to
great distances on the usually smooth
ocean, that vast blue Pacific.
| That Kailua storekeeper needs farther
notice He was agent for a leading mer-
chant at Honolulu When my father was
building his house, he, used to give mis-
workmen written orders on the trader
for goods. Many orders read please
give SO and so five (more or less)
glasses These glasses We're miserable
little shaving mirrors which distorted the
features, sold at 25 cents each. In the
following year, 1892 came back from
Boston the grave inquiry what meant
this charge against Mr.. Bishop of trad
ing with the natives in liquor, as veri-
fled by these written orders for glasses
which the Kailua trader has forwarded
as evidence along with other accumula-
tions CT equally strong testimony to
missionary hypocrisy, which a Honolulu
| syndicate caused to be published in Bos-
ton!
| Missionaries We're far more obnoxious
In those days than missionaries sons
are now, being even better people than the
latter. and their white opponents a rath-
er hard set. Nearly every half-white
youth of early days in Hawaii was
brought up in an atmosphere pervaded
with the most violent yilification of mis-
sioparies, and these continual calumnies
were a frequent theme of discussion in
the missionary homes A newspaper. in
Honolulu called the Sandwich Island
Gazette teemed with absurd charges
and misconstructions of all kinds, which
I used to read with much juvenile indig-
Ination. 1t was certainly a great hard
comfortably hung UP their consciences
at Cape Horn and were living in Sc
rene satisfaction after the heather ethi-
cal code, to have these perverse mission
aries pick those consciences off from the
Horn bring them along to Hawaii, wind
them up and set them running. One may
forgive the boys for displaying some
sinners they We're making of themselves
among the Kanakas. The two elements
could not come into contact without
much noisy effervescence.
Money in those days was hardly a
medium of exchange among the natives,
most of whom were not familiar with
| the appearance of coin.
! What coin was in circulation was en-
tirely Spanish, in dollars, quarters and
reals, all probably coined in Spanish
America. In my boyhood I never saw a
! British or United States coin of any
sort. Gold was not at all in circulation.
| / did see once or twice a Spanish doup-
loon. Our purchases from the natives
were paid for usually with school books
and states, but sometimes with a few
yards of blue or white cotton cloth, or
with fish hooks or horn combs. Labor
was hired in the same way. Up to 1888
on Oahu, the regular wage OF ordinary
labor was one real or s0125 day usual
ly paid by orders on store There was
great poverty, although provident ma
tives in good seasons generally had plen-
ty to eat. But any one who had a good
supply of food would at once be visited
and lived upon by all his kindred. Thus
all thrift and saving was discouraged
and unknown. The only way to prosper
was to be a chief with a good tract OF
land and a body of retainers or serfs
Nearly all except .lne cnleIlSn ones Wei
serfs cultivating small ailotments, hello
subject to the will of their masters. The
masters were not commonly severe, YET
there was much cruel oppression, ane
little sense of human rights.
Recurring to the use of agricultural
implements, / never in early boyhooe
saw a pillow, scythe or a sickle, and
think, not spade or shovel. My impress
sion is that although the soil of Kona If
Exceedingly fertile, no blowing is possible
on account of rocks. Most of the lava
streams which entirely covered the lane
were of the a-a, or clinker variety. Hole:
would be made with an 90 into these
rough, brittle stone-heaps and a slip O.
sweet potato vine inserted, which woule
grow luxuriantly. Much of the lavf
had undergone sufficient decay to form
patches of very rich soil, in which taro
sugar cane and bananas grew luxuriant
ly. There were many breadfruit trees OF
the upland, although their fruit did no
constitute any large part of the people,
food. We had no wheeled vehicles, no
even a wheelbarrow. During our las
year at Kailua a black pony came ant
was used by the two mission families
The two clergymen rode it in turn OF
their short trips to preaching stations
and the ladies logged along occasional.
on side-saddle. None of the natives
those days had horses, except the prince
ly, class of chiefs, and they We're gener
] lally carried IN large litterc by scores O