The sun., 1908-06-07
A CHINESE ROBINSON CRUsOE.
wild Man Of Papaik koumanka" Dead After
Thirty Years OF Solitude.

wild Man Of Papaik Oumanka" Dead After
Thirty Years OF Solitude.
People who have not been to Hilo the lit
tie seaport on the island Of Hawaii, may
not think it matter of moment that the
wild Chinaman OF Papaikoumanka' is
dead. Like many worthy folk. All Chow
did not have his name printed much In the
newspapers until after he died. but that
was the fault Of the papers and net of All
Chow.
They say down in Hilo that All Chow came
to the islands thirty years ago as contract
laborer on a sugar plantation. He evil
IDENTIFY didnot like being a contract laborer,
for he fled from the plantation soon after
his arrival and worked his way up to the
almost inaccessible mountain orag OF Papal-
koumanka to little plateau hanging diz-
zly over cliffs edge. When some of the
plantation men went to get him All Chow put
up such fight by rolling boulders down on
the only trail to his retreat that the attempt
TO bring him back was given up.
Eighteen years ago the report spread about
the country thereabouts that the lonely
Chinaman was a leper and posse was sent
up the mountain to bring him into town for
transportation to Molokai, the Hawaiian
with boulders until they gained foothod
| on his narrow shelf Of the mountain, and
then charged the timorous Kanakas with a
spear fashioned Of hard wood and with the
point hardened in the fire.
He was captured finally and examined.
1t was found that the wild China man did
not have leprosy and he was allowed TO 20
back to his aerie on the mountain.
From that day until the Chinamap 3
! body was found month ago. lying II, a
rude coffin Of his own making inside his
hut, no man is known to have spoken with
him and few had seen him. The tax
| assessor and tax collector gave him a wide
berth; the man who owned the land which
he had preempted made no attempt to
eject him, He never came down of the
mountain and neither white man nor Kanaka
cared to go up to see him.
| His body was stumbled on by a stranger
who had gone up the mountain without
posed to wait at the top for ali intTuders. %
| When this stranger reported his find several
men from the nearest plantation went up
| to the wild Chinamans hut.
The body could not be removed, 80 a
pile OF wood was heaped about it and 1t
| was burned where 1t lay. with the hut which
| had for thirty years been the lonely hermit
, age Of All Chow. The strange man must
have known the approach Of death and
deliberately laid himself down in his coffin
to die alone,
The Investigators looked about and dis
covered how 1t was that the wild man had
lived high up on the mountain, alone with
birds By what must have been tremendous
and long continued effort Ah Chow had
cleared about two acres Of the tropical
jungle back of his hut on the mountain shelf
and had there planted pineapples, peanuts
mangoes and potatoes.
He had even set out a few orange and
lemon trees. probably from cuttings stolen
at nights from the plantation homes below
him. The old man had kept no animals: an
the bitter work of grubbing the Jungle
from his place he had done with his own
hands.
Besides the vegetables that had sus-
tanned old An Chow the hermit had not
lacked for fesh. as bird snares and nets
found In his hut and set about among the
nearby trees showed. He had even FASH
Toned out OF bamboo q sort of sampitar,
or blowg,In, such az Is used by the natives
OF the Dutch East Indies, which will propela q
dart several hundred feet.
Like another Robinson Grusoe All Chow
had lived on his dizzy shelf OF rock high
above and even within sight of the civilisas
t8n thst spread out below hin N plantatl9a