He Would Always Be Quite Excited
At That; And Say - "Aole!" (No.) "Me No Eat Captain Cook!
Me
pikinini - small - so high - no more!
My father see Captain Cook!
Me - no!" None of them liked to have anything said about Captain
Cook, for the sailors all believe that he was eaten, and that,
they cannot endure to be taunted with. - "New Zealand Kanaka eat
white man; - Sandwich Island Kanaka - no. Sandwich Island Kanaka
ua like pu na haole - all 'e same a' you!"
Mr. Bingham was a sort of patriarch among them, and was always
treated with great respect, though he had not the education and energy
which gave Mr. Mannini his power over them. I have spent hours in
talking with this old fellow about Kamehameha, the Charlemagne
of the Sandwich Islands; his son and successor Riho Riho, who died
in England, and was brought to Oahu in the frigate Blonde, Captain
Lord Byron, and whose funeral he remembered perfectly; and also
about the customs of his country in his boyhood, and the changes
which had been made by the missionaries. He never would allow that
human beings had been eaten there; and, indeed, it always seemed
like an insult to tell so affectionate, intelligent, and civilized
a class of men, that such barbarities had been practised in their
own country within the recollection of many of them. Certainly,
the history of no people on the globe can show anything like so
rapid an advance. I would have trusted my life and my fortune in
the hands of any one of these people; and certainly had I wished
for a favor or act of sacrifice, I would have gone to them all,
in turn, before I should have applied to one of my own countrymen
on the coast, and should have expected to have seen it done,
before my own countrymen had got half through counting the cost.
Their costumes, and manner of treating one another, show a simple,
primitive generosity, which is truly delightful; and which is often
a reproach to our own people.
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