The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1908-06-03

,Jo.H q. Wooley, Lid, in Chicago
Dai News.)
HONOLULU, April ID am writing
I.-I .etter in the midst of the saddest,
.1.dnLest, serenest community in the
aor 3. 1t occupies a lite cape of fair
evel land on the windward coast
of the island of Molokai, walled in be-
lind 1000 feet OF sheer, gray precipice
and 1000 miles of sheer blue ocean
stretching northward and upward to
the sky.
From the Travelled road of passing
steamships tourists see a pretty vi lage
outlining grassy ways, with well-dress-
ed lawns and gardens playing hide and
seek among the groves of palms and
every kind of tree that loves the
! tropics and can bear this stark expos
ure to the stiff trade wind
When the northeast trades blow hard
no ship can land here, for there is no
narbor and the whole water front is
| lava rocks that tear the great Pacific
swells to rags, day in, day out, never
lrelenting.
Rearward, stairway" trail" by
courtesy-has been zig-zagged up the
cliff to give a possible exit to the lee
shore, so that mail, the vitalest COM
merce of the pathetic little city, shall
never fail. Food supplies are thus
made certain, too, but these however
Indispensable, are secondary in inipor
lance, by Kaaupapa estimates.
LEPER SETTLEMENT.
1t is Kalaupapa, the leper settlement
of the Hawaiian Islands. Here for
forty years al victims of what Ha-
without regard to station, wealth or
nationality, have been segregated, by
the law, to stop the spread of the pain
less, insidious, hideous living death
hat feeds upon the beauty and the
symmetry of "the human form div
me-" but leaves the vital parts I'M
scathed to see and know and contem-
plate the process of dIlapidation.
Nearly a thousad people, in all stages
and forms of leprosy, are domiciled in
bodies decompose afoot, moving about,
gardening, visiting, holding meetings,
giving concerts, playing games, cleo
tioneering, voting, worshiping, marry
ing, reproducing.
Love prosecutes her ancient forms
unchecked unchanged Swapping
young Leanders, marked for slow de-
struction, swim to meet fated, but
| beautiful Heros waiting at appointed
palm trees, when the full moon glOri-
fies the beach and the constant surf
roars everything beside to silence
] said it is a sad community, and
certainly that adjective needs no sup
port. But it is more strange than sad,
because no village life in any country
matches it in pure serenity. And the
causes are less hard to find than one
would think in passing.
HAWAIIAN TEMPERAMENT.
Hawaiian temperament is sunny as
| Hawaiian skies. These children of the
tropics break into a wall at a great
sorrow, but quickly turn their hearts
and faces to the light, as flowers when
the storm has overpast. There are
great possibilities of joy in the do
main of affliction, and these the Poly
nesian eyes are quick to see.
Even to colder, slower northern
minds there is a certain undertow OF
peace in all inevitable calamity. Men
condemned to execution are nearly. al
ways cam And in my own small way
it has been given me to know the saw
ing strength Of quietness when friends
We're yisibN and surely false, and loss
es overwhelmed like avalanches.
The jeer and threat of poverty are
unknown here and friendliness is as
pervasive as the air OF whatever err
rors in legislation or administration
might be made in the South Sea, in
humanity would not be one The love
of life is strong, selfward and other
ward and the government of Hawaii
is as tender as an elder sister of this
pathetic, shut-in colony.
WHEN THE SYMPTOMS SHOW
The GG,h act in the leper tragedy
comes at the beginning. When the
first dreaded symptoms show them
selves, the weeks and months Of anX-
ions watching weigh most heavily.
4 Then other weeks and months in fear
of detection follow hard The family
. loyalty obliterates all fear of conta-
gion, even when deadly certainty has
camped upon the scene. No wife quits
her husbands bed for knowledge that
. me rs lepor No sweetheart withholds
her kisses for the ominous white spot
upon her lovers cheek The awful
secret is as safe with relatives ana
/ friends as though the only lips that
could tell it We're closed i'm death.
| But finally detection comes. The
examining board sits. The microscope
tears down the last defenses. The ago
my eliminates in the torture of good
/ bys when The leper ship casts Off with
the exile loaded with wreaths, wayine
.lF.I Ia. Ia.