The Meal Was Not Less Rude Than The Cookery.

We ate it on the floor of the wigwam, with an old tin, with some fat in it, for a lamp, and a bit of rope for a wick, which kept tumbling into the fat and leaving us in darkness.

The next day I came up here alone, driving a pack-horse, and with a hind-quarter of sheep tied to my saddle. It is really difficult to find the way over this desert, though I have been several times across. When a breeze ripples the sand between the lava hummocks, the footprints are obliterated, and there are few landmarks except the "ox bone" and the "small ohia." It is a strange life up here on the mountain side, but I like it, and never yearn after civilization. The one drawback is my ignorance of the language, which not only places me sometimes in grotesque difficulties, but deprives me of much interest. I don't know what day it is, or how long I have been here, and quite understand how possible it would be to fall into an indolent and aimless life, in which time is of no account.

THE RECTORY, KONA. August 1st.

I left Hualalai yesterday morning, and dined with my kind host and hostess in the wigwam. It was the last taste of the wild Hawaiian life I have learned to love so well, the last meal on a mat, the last exercise of skill in eating "two-fingered" poi. I took leave gratefully of those who had been so truly kind to me, and with the friendly aloha from kindly lips in my ears, regretfully left the purple desert in which I have lived so serenely, and plunged into the forest gloom. Half way down, I met a string of my native acquaintances, who, as the courteous custom is, threw over me leis of maile and roses, and since I arrived here, others have called to wish me goodbye, bringing presents of figs, cocoa-nuts and bananas.

This is one of the stations of the "Honolulu Mission," and Mr. Davies, the clergyman, has, besides Sunday and daily services, a day-school for boys and girls. The Sunday attendance at church, so far as I have seen, consists of three adults, though the white population within four miles is considerable, and at another station on Maui, the congregation was composed solely of the family of a planter. Clerical reinforcements are expected from England shortly; but from what I have seen and heard everywhere, I do not think that the coming clergy, even if inspired by the same devotion and disinterestedness as Bishop Willis, will make any sensible progress among the people.

In truth, I believe that the "Honolulu Mission," from the first, has been a mistake. As such, strictly speaking, there is no room for it, for all the natives are nominal Christians, and are connected more or less with the Congregational denomination. To attempt to proselytize them to the English Church, or to unsettle their religious relations in any way, would, on the whole, be a hopeless, as well as an invidious task, and would not improbably result in driving some among them into the greater apparent unity of the Church of Rome. Those who believe in the oneness of the invisible church, and that all who hold "one Lord, one faith, one baptism," are within the pale of salvation, may well hesitate before expending energy, men, money, and time on proselytizing efforts.

Among the whites who have sunk into the mire of an indolent and godless, if not an openly immoral life, there is an undoubted field for Evangelistic effort; but it is very doubtful, I think, whether this class can be reached by services which appeal to higher culture and instincts than it possesses, and, indeed, generally, the island Episcopalians are not in sympathy with the "symbolism" and "high ritual" which from the first have been outstanding features of this "mission." The education of the young in the principles of the Prayer Book is aimed at by the Bishop and his coadjutors, but in spite of zeal and devotion, I doubt whether the English Church on these islands can ever be anything but a pining and sickly exotic.

Kona looks supremely beautiful, a languid dream of all fair things. Yet truly my heart warms to nothing so much as to a row of fat English cabbages which grow in the rectory garden, with a complacent, self-asserting John Bullism about them. It is best to leave the islands now. I love them better every day, and dreams of Fatherland are growing fainter in this perfumed air and under this glittering sky. A little longer, and I too should say, like all who have made their homes here under the deep banana shade, -

"We will return no more, . . . . our island home Is far beyond the wave, we will no longer roam." I.L.B.

LETTER XXXI.

HAWAIIAN HOTEL, HONOLULU. August 6th.

My fate is lying at the wharf in the shape of the Pacific Mail Steamer Costa Rica, and soon to me Hawaii-nei will be but a dream. "Summer isles of Eden!" My heart warms towards them as I leave them, for they have been more like home than any part of the world since I left England. The moonlight is trickling through misty algarobas, and feathery tamarinds and palms, and shines on glossy leaves of breadfruit and citron; a cool breeze brings in at my open doors the perfumed air and the soft murmur of the restful sea, and this beautiful Honolulu, whose lights are twinkling through the purple night, is at last, as it was at first, Paradise in the Pacific, a bright blossom of a summer sea.

I shall be in the Rocky Mountains before you receive my hastily- written reply to your proposal to come out here for a year, but I will add a few reasons against it, in addition to the one which I gave regarding the benefit which I now hope to derive from a change to a more stimulating climate.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 115 of 125
Words from 116763 to 117785 of 127766