The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1903-03-16
FUNERAL
lMPRESSES
OBSERVER
By Sol. N. Sheridan.

king That is the old Hawaiian of it !
1t was weather to make a white mans
holiday. That is the nineteenth CEN
fury Americanism of it. Just overcast
a trifie making a good light for kodak
pictures, and with a spit of rain falling
now and again. but not enough to hurt
the whitest of white clothes. But you
felt that a tropical storm was brooding
in the air, and that it might break
upon the city at any moment.
And under the clouds. through the
threat of the tropical storm. past the
Americans perched with their kodaks
upon the points of vantage along the
wav. defled the slow length of the fu-
neral train of one of the Polynesian
blood royal
1t was a strange sight, sight a bit
anachronistic Perhaps it was sight
in its solemn mingling of the mourn
ing trappings of the Anglo-SaXon ana
of the dark islander that can be seem
TODAY. nowhere outside of Honolulu. II
may never. even, be seen here again
For the man that had passed was the
| last of the heirs of the kamehamehas'
II is told. and that was the real old
royal line.
Americans are not much accustomed
| RI state funerals. The American Ire
is too vivid to permit of the putting
on by the whole nation, at one time
of the trappings of woe. And America
is too big. There are too many VINO
viii laugh as the dead go by-tor
America. is likewise young, and irrever-
emf state funeral where the police
come by, as always. first, and then
brass band and soldiers is still slght
that most of US have seen. But where
IIeadingsthe soldiers, a lot of women also
come ty In deepest black. women who
mourn thus because they were and are
of the highest that a decadent people,
4 could show in its prime. surely that Is
a sight such as can be seen nowhere
| else on the globe today. And state
funeral where the catafalque is drawn
bv a long double file of young men,
dark young men in yellow cloaks, VINO
Tins honor one who was of the blood
of their chiefs. that can be seen mo-
where else. Lastly, the catafalque
decorated with the insignia Of a royalty
that had an individuality when 1t lived
though it is now dead, surrounded by
the feather kahilis that would be gay If
they were not the recognized trap
nings of royal woe, surely, surely II
was a picture out of the past that has
been dead for so long men have all but
forgotten it.
Not now. as in the old days, did max
ed painted heather howl around the
bier of the dead, making the whole
. Garth \ saturnalia for their lawiess
passions and now and again, when they
. thought of it, knocking out tooth OF
killing one of the common people py
way of showing how they grieved foi
the dead chief. The mourning, the
chanting of the genealogies of the dead
the waving of the kahilis above MS
bier. the lying in state while the PEG
pie. white and native, defiled arouhc
the coffin laid in u room that Is th'
: last possibility in the modernity OF 1T
furnishings. all that les decorous now
That much the Hawaiians owe 10 th'
influences that have civilized them
@ The days of the funeral orgy are gon'
! by. and the life of the lowest IS san
when the highest dies. though the dea'
he of the lineage of Kamehameha o
Hawaii. But the resultant mingilh:
of the new with the old. the graft
ing of the dead march upon the meic
the signs of sober woe upon the iacS
;, of a people that were wont to. 60 ma
. at the coming of death, all. all ia
: about it something incongruous- l
=, was fitting. and yet not fitting. An
:, the crowd went home from tuner al
!, and also from a holiday pageant.
= Do not mistake me. There was
irreverence in this, no lack of respec
for the grim power that will reach GU
some day and gather Us all TO itsel
- HIGH and lowIy. we raise our hats
- death passing by. The trappings me
y put upon the destroyer tell other an
II various stories. The native crowd wef
: home sad and sorrowful. Each inc
dent Of the day and each part OF IN
ma oaant had. to them. a meaning syn
= boIic of the end. that is to come 10 u
If aIl-nay. to some. it may have carrie
h. even a deeper meaning, of the dooi
y that will slowly sweep them. as a rae
from the sons Of earth. The America
- went home. as from a holiday pagean l
l. and sighed a little. perhaps, that u
81 show was so soon over.
NOTICE