Chapter IV: Introduction: I. the Book and Its Writer; Scope of the Present Edition (2)

Two things result as a consequence of the taboo right in the hands of a chief. In the first place, the effort is constantly to keep before his following the exclusive position of the chief and to emphasize in every possible way his divine character as descended from a god. Such is the meaning of the insignia of rank--in Hawaii, the taboo staff which warns men of his neighborhood, the royal feather cloak, the high seat apart in the double canoe, the head of the feast, the special apparel of his followers, the size of his house and of his war canoe, the superior workmanship and decoration of all his equipment, since none but the chief can command the labor for their execution. In the second place, this very effort to aggrandize him above his fellows puts every material advantage in the hands of the chief. The taboo means that he can command, at the community expense, the best of the food supply, the most splendid ornaments, equipment, and clothing. He is further able, again at the community expense, to keep dependent upon himself, because fed at his table, a large following, all held in duty bound to carry out his will. Even the land was, in Hawaii and other Polynesian communities, under the control of the chief, to be redistributed whenever a new chief came into power. The taboo system thus became the means for economic distribution, for the control of the relation between the sexes, and for the preservation of the dignity of the chief class. As such it constituted as powerful an instrument for the control of the labor and wealth of a community and the consequent enjoyment of personal ease and luxury as was ever put into the hands of an organized upper class. It profoundly influenced class distinctions, encouraged exclusiveness and the separation of the upper ranks of society from the lower.[8]

To act as intermediary with his powerful line of ancestors and perform all the ceremonials befitting the rank to which he has attained, the chief employs a priesthood, whose orders and offices are also graded according to the rank into which the priest is born and the patronage he is able to secure for himself.[9] Even though the priest may be, when inspired by his god, for the time being treated like a god and given divine honors, as soon as the possession leaves him he returns to his old rank in the community.[10] Since chief and priest base their pretensions upon the same divine authority, each supports the other, often the one office including the other;[11] the sacerdotal influence is, therefore, while it acts as a check upon the chief, on the whole aristocratic.

The priest represented in Polynesian society what we may call the professional class in our own. Besides conducting religious ceremonials, he consulted the gods on matters of administration and state policy, read the omens, understood medicine, guarded the genealogies and the ancient lore, often acted as panegyrist and debater for the chief. All these powers were his in so far as he was directly inspired by the god who spoke through him as medium to the people.[12]

_Footnotes to Section II, 6: The story as a reflection of aristocratic social life_

[Footnote 1: J.A. Macculloch (in Childhood of Fiction, p. 2) says, comparing the literary ability of primitive people: "Those who possess the most elaborate and imaginative tales are the Red Indians and Polynesians."]

[Footnote 2: Moerenhout, II, 4, 265.]

[Footnote 3: Gracia (p. 47) says that the taboo consists in the interdict from touching some food or object which, has been dedicated to a god. The chief by his divine descent represents the god. Compare Ellis, IV, 385; Mariner, II, 82, 173; Turner, Samoa, pp. 112, 185; Fison, pp. 1-3; Malo, p. 83; Dibble, p. 12; Moerenhout, I, 528-533. Fornander says of conditions in Hawaii: "The chiefs in the genealogy from Kane were called _Ka Hoalii_ or 'anointed' (_poni ia_) with the water of Kane (_wai-niu-a-Kane_) and they became 'divine tabu chiefs' (_na lii kapu-akua_). Their genealogy is called _Iku-pau_, because it alone leads up to the beginning of all genealogies. They had two taboo rights, the ordinary taboo of the chiefs (_Kapu-alii_) and the taboo of the gods (_Kapu-akua_). The genealogy of the lower ranks of chiefs (_he lii noa_), on the other hand, was called _Iku-nuu_. Their power was temporal and they accordingly were entitled only to the ordinary taboo of chiefs (_Kapu-alii_)."]

[Footnote 4: Compare Krämer, Samoa Inseln, p. 31; Stair, p. 75; Turner, Samoa, p. 173; White, II, 62, and the Fornander stories of _Aukele_ and of _Kila_, where capacity, not precedence of birth, determines the hero's rank.]

[Footnote 5: In certain groups inheritance descends on the mother's side only. See Krämer, op. cit., pp. 15, 39; Mariner, II, 89, 98. Compare Mariner, II, 210-212; Stair, p. 222. In Fison (p. 65) the story of _Longapoa_, shows what a husband of lower rank may endure from a termagant wife of high rank.]

[Footnote 6: Krämer (p. 32 et seq.) tells us that in Samoa the daughter of a high chief is brought up with extreme care that she may be given virgin to her husband. She is called _taupo_, "dove," and, when she comes of age, passes her time with the other girls of her own age in the _fale aualuma_ or "house of the virgins," of whom she assumes the leadership. Into this house, where the girls also sleep at night, no youth dare enter.

Compare Fornander's stories of _Kapuaokaoheloai_ and _Hinaaikamalama_.

See also Stair, p. 110; Mariner, II, 142, 212; Fison, p. 33.

According to Gracia (p. 62) candidates in the Marquesas for the priesthood are strictly bound to a taboo of chastity.]

[Footnote 7: Rivers, I, 374; Malo, p. 80.

Gracia (p. 41) says that the Marquesan genealogy consists in a long line of gods and goddesses married and representing a genealogy of chiefs. To the thirtieth generation they are brothers and sisters. After this point the relation is no longer observed.]

[Footnote 8: Keaulumoku's description of a Hawaiian chief (Islander, 1875) gives a good idea of the distinction felt between the classes:

"A well-supplied dish is the wooden dish,
The high-raftered sleeping-house with shelves;
The long eating-house for women.
The rushes are spread down, upon them is spread the mat,
They lie on their backs, with heads raised in dignity,
The fly brushers wave to and fro at the door; the door is shut,
the black _tapa_ is drawn up.

"Haste, hide a little in refreshing sleep, dismiss fatigue.
They sleep by day in the silence where noise is forbidden.
If they sleep two and two, double is their sleep;
Enjoyable is the fare of the large-handed man.
In parrying the spear the chief is vigorous;
the breaking of points is sweet.
Delightful is the season of fish, the season of food;
when one is filled with fish, when one is filled with food.
Thou art satisfied with food, O thou common man,
To be satisfied with land is for the chief."

Compare the account of the Fiji chief in Williams and Calvert, I, 33-42.]

[Footnote 9: Stair, p. 220; Gracia, p. 59; Alexander, History, chap. IV; Malo, p. 210. The name used for the priesthood of Hawaii, _kahuna_, is the same as that applied in the Marquesas, according to Gracia (p. 60), to the order of chanters.]

[Footnote 10: Gracia, p. 46; Mariner, II, 87, 101, 125; Gill, Myths and Songs, pp. 20, 21; Moerenhout, I, 474-482.]

[Footnote 11: Malo, p. 69.]

[Footnote 12: Ellis (III, 36) describes the art of medicine in Polynesia, and Erdland (p. 77) says that on the Marshall Islands knowledge of the stars and weather signs is handed down to a favorite child and can raise rank by attaching a man to the service of a chief.

Compare Mariner, II, 90; Moerenhout, I, 409; Williams and Calvert, I, 111.]

III. THE ART OF COMPOSITION

1. ARISTOCRATIC NATURE OF POLYNESIAN ART

The arts of song and oratory, though practiced by all classes,[1] were considered worthy to be perfected among the chiefs themselves and those who sought their patronage. Of a chief the Polynesian says, "He speaks well."[2] Hawaiian stories tell of heroes famous in the _hoopapa_, or art of debating; in the _hula_, or art of dance and song; of chiefs who learned the lore of the heavens and the earth from some supernatural master in order to employ their skill competitively. The _oihana haku-mele_, or "business of song making," was hence an aristocratic art. The able composer, man or woman, even if of low rank, was sure of patronage as the _haku mele_, "sorter of songs," for some chief; and his name was attached to the song he composed. A single poet working alone might produce the panegyric; but for the longer and more important songs of occasion a group got together, the theme was proposed and either submitted to a single composer or required line by line from each member of the group. In this way each line as it was composed was offered for criticism lest any ominous allusion creep in to mar the whole by bringing disaster upon the person celebrated, and as it was perfected it was committed to memory by the entire group, thus insuring it against loss. Protective criticism, therefore, and exact transmission were secured by group composition.[3]

Exactness of reproduction was in fact regarded as a proof of divine inspiration. When the chief's sons were trained to recite the genealogical chants, those who were incapable were believed to lack a share in the divine inheritance; they were literally "less gifted" than their brothers.[4]

This distinction accorded to the arts of song and eloquence is due to their actual social value. The _mele_, or formal poetic chants which record the deeds of heroic ancestors, are of aristocratic origin and belong to the social assets of the family to which they pertain. The claim of an heir to rank depends upon his power to reproduce, letter perfect, his family chants and his "name song," composed to celebrate his birth, and hence exact transmission is a matter of extreme importance. Facility in debate is not only a competitive art, with high stakes attached, but is employed in time of war to shame an enemy,[5] quickness of retort being believed, like quickness of hand, to be a God-given power. Chants in memory of the dead are demanded of each relative at the burial ceremony.[6] Song may be used to disgrace an enemy, to avenge an insult, to predict defeat at arms. It may also be turned to more pleasing purposes--to win back an estranged patron or lover;[7] in the art of love, indeed, song is invaluable to a chief. Ability in learning and language is, therefore, a highly prized chiefly art, respected for its social value and employed to aggrandize rank. How this aristocratic patronage has affected the language of composition will be presently clear.

_Footnotes to Section III, 1: Aristocratic Nature of Polynesian Art_

[Footnote 1: Jarves says: "Songs and chants were common among all classes, and recited by strolling musicians as panegyrics on occasions of joy, grief, or worship. Through them the knowledge of events in the lives of prominent persons or the annals of the nation were perpetuated. The chief art lay in the formation of short metrical sentences without much regard to the rhythmical terminations. Monosyllables, dissyllables, and trisyllables had each their distinct time. The natives repeat their lessons, orders received, or scraps of ancient song, or extemporize in this monotonous singsong tone for hours together, and in perfect accord."

Compare Ellis's Tour, p. 155.]

[Footnote 2: Moerenhout, I, 411.]

[Footnote 3: Andrews, Islander, 1875, p. 35; Emerson, Unwritten Literature, pp. 27, 38.]

[Footnote 4: In Fornander's story of _Lonoikamakahiki_, the chief memorizes in a single night a new chant just imported from Kauai so accurately as to establish his property right to the song.]

[Footnote 5: Compare with Ellis, I, 286, and Williams and Calvert, I, 46, 50, the notes on the boxing contest in the text of _Laieikawai_.]

[Footnote 6: Gill, Myths and Songs, pp. 268 et seq.]

[Footnote 7: See Fornander's stories of _Lonoikamakahiki, Halemano_, and _Kuapakaa_.]

2. NOMENCLATURE: ITS EMOTIONAL VALUE

The Hawaiian (or Polynesian) composer who would become a successful competitor in the fields of poetry, oratory, or disputation must store up in his memory the rather long series of names for persons, places, objects, or phases of nature which constitute the learning of the aspirant for mastery in the art of expression. He is taught, says one tale, "about everything in the earth and in the heavens"--- that is, their names, their distinguishing characterstics. The classes of objects thus differentiated naturally are determined by the emotional interest attached to them, and this depends upon their social or economic value to the group.

The social value of pedigree and property have encouraged genealogical and geographical enumeration. A long recitation of the genealogies of chiefs provides immense emotional satisfaction and seems in no way to overtax the reciter's memory. Missionaries tell us that "the Hawaiians will commit to memory the genealogical tables given in the Bible, and delight to repeat them as some of the choicest passages in Scripture." Examples of such genealogies are common; it is, in fact, the part of the reciter to preserve the pedigree of his chief in a formal genealogical chant.

Such a series is illustrated in the genealogy embedded in the famous song to aggrandize the family of the famous chief Kualii, which carries back the chiefly line of Hawaii through 26 generations to Wakea and Papa, ancestors of the race.

"Hulihonua the man,
Keakahulilani the woman,
Laka the man, Kepapaialeka the woman,"

runs the song, the slight variations evidently fitting the sound to the movement of the recitative.

In the eleventh section of the "Song of Creation" the poet says:

She that lived up in the heavens and Piolani,
She that was full of enjoyments and lived in the heavens,
Lived up there with Kii and became his wife,
Brought increase to the world;

and he proceeds to the enumeration of her "increase":

Kamahaina was born a man,
Kamamule his brother,
Kamaainau was born next,
Kamakulua was born, the youngest a woman.

Following this family group come a long series, more than 650 pairs of so-called husbands and wives. After the first 400 or so, the enumeration proceeds by variations upon a single name. We have first some 50 _Kupo_ (dark nights)--"of wandering," "of wrestling," "of littleness," etc.; 60 or more _Polo_; 50 _Liili_; at least 60 _Alii_ (chiefs); followed by _Mua_ and _Loi_ in about the same proportion.

At the end of this series we read that--

Storm was born, Tide was born,
Crash was born, and also bursts of bubbles.
Confusion was born, also rushing, rumbling shaking earth.

So closes the "second night of Wakea," which, it is interesting to note, ends like a charade in the death of Kupololiilialiimualoipo, whose nomenclature has been so vastly accumulating through the 200 or 300 last lines. Notice how the first word _Kupo_ of the series opens and swallows all the other five.

Such recitative and, as it were, symbolic use of genealogical chants occurs over and over again. That the series is often of emotional rather than of historical value is suggested by the wordplays and by the fact that the hero tales do not show what is so characteristic of Icelandic saga--a care to record the ancestry of each character as it is introduced into the story. To be sure, they commonly begin with the names of the father and mother of the hero, and their setting; but in the older mythological tales these are almost invariably _Ku_ and _Hina_, a convention almost equivalent to the phrase "In the olden time"; but, besides fixing the divine ancestry of the hero, carrying also with it an idea of kinship with those to whom the tale is related, which is not without its emotional value.

Geographical names, although not enumerated to such an extent in any of the tales and songs now accessible, also have an important place in Hawaiian composition. In the _Laieikawai_ 76 places are mentioned by name, most of them for the mere purpose of identifying a route of travel. A popular form of folk tale is the following, told in Waianae, Oahu: "Over in Kahuku lived a high chief, Kaho'alii. He instructed his son 'Fly about Oahu while I chew the _awa_; before I have emptied it into the cup return to me and rehearse to me all that you have seen.'" The rest of the tale relates the youth's enumeration of the places he has seen on the way.

If we turn to the chants the suggestive use of place names becomes still more apparent. Dr. Hyde tells us (_Hawaiian Annual_, 1890, p. 79): "In the Hawaiian chant (_mele_) and dirge (_kanikau_) the aim seems to be chiefly to enumerate every place associated with the subject, and to give that place some special epithet, either attached to it by commonplace repetition or especially devised for the occasion as being particularly characteristic." An example of this form of reference is to be found in the _Kualii_ chant. We read:

Where is the battle-field
Where the warrior is to fight?
On the field of Kalena,
At Manini, at Hanini,
Where was poured the water of the god,
By your work at Malamanui,
At the heights of Kapapa, at Paupauwela,
Where they lean and rest.

In the play upon the words _Manini_ and _Hanini_ we recognize some rhetorical tinkering, but in general the purpose here is to enumerate the actual places famous in Kualii's history.

At other times a place-name is used with allusive interest, the suggested incident being meant, like certain stories alluded to in the Anglo-Saxon "Beowulf," to set off, by comparison or contrast, the present situation. It is important for the poet to know, for example, that the phrase "flowers of Paiahaa" refers to the place on Kau, Hawaii, where love-tokens cast into the sea at a point some 20 or 30 miles distant on the Puna coast, invariably find their way to shore in the current and bring their message to watchful lovers.

A third use of localization conforms exactly to our own sense of description. The Island of Kauai is sometimes visible lying off to the northwest of Oahu. At this side of the island rises the Waianae range topped by the peak Kaala. In old times the port of entry for travelers to Oahu from Kauai was the seacoast village of Waianae. Between it and the village of Waialua runs a great spur of the range, which breaks off abruptly at the sea, into the point Kaena. Kahuku point lies beyond Waialua at the northern extremity of the island. Mokuleia, with its old inland fishpond, is the first village to the west of Waialua. This is the setting for the following lines, again taken from the chant of _Kualii_, the translation varying only slightly from that edited by Thrum:

O Kauai,
Great Kauai, inherited from ancestors,
Sitting in the calm of Waianae,
A cape is Kaena,
Beyond, Kahuku,
A misty mountain back, where the winds meet, Kaala,
There below sits Waialua,
Waialua there,
Kahala is a dish for Mokuleia,
A fishpond for the shark roasted in ti-leaf,
The tail of the shark is Kaena,
The shark that goes along below Kauai,
Below Kauai, thy land,
Kauai O!

The number of such place names to be stored in the reciter's memory is considerable. Not only are they applied in lavish profusion to beach, rock, headland, brook, spring, cave, waterfall, even to an isolated tree of historic interest, and distributed to less clearly marked small land areas to name individual holdings, but, because of the importance of the weather in the fishing and seagoing life of the islander, they are affixed to the winds, the rains, and the surf or "sea" of each locality. All these descriptive appellations the composer must employ to enrich his means of place allusion. Even to-day the Hawaiian editor with a nice sense of emotional values will not, in his obituary notice, speak of a man being missed in his native district, but will express the idea in some such way as this: "Never more will the pleasant _Kupuupuu_ (mist-bearing wind) dampen his brow." The songs of the pleading sisters in the romance of _Laieikawai_ illustrate this conventional usage. In _Kualii_, the poet wishes to express the idea that all the sea belongs to the god Ku. He therefore enumerates the different kinds of "sea," with their locality--"the sea for surf riding," "the sea for casting the net," "the sea for going naked," "the sea for swimming," "the sea for surf riding sideways," "the sea for tossing up mullet," "the sea for small crabs," "the sea of many harbors," etc.

The most complete example of this kind of enumeration occurs in the chant of Kuapakaa, where the son of the disgraced chief chants to his lord the names of the winds and rains of all the districts about each island in succession, and then, by means of his grandmother's bones in a calabash in the bottom of the canoe (she is the Hawaiian wind-goddess) raises a storm and avenges his father's honor. He sings:

There they are! There they are!!
There they are!!!
The hard wind of Kohala,
The short sharp wind of Kawaihae,
The fine mist of Waimea,
The wind playing in the cocoanut-leaves of Kekaha,
The soft wind of Kiholo,
The calm of Kona,
The ghost-like wind of Kahaluu,
The wind in the hala-tree of Kaawaloa,
The moist wind of Kapalilua,
The whirlwind of Kau,
The mischievous wind of Hoolapa,
The dust-driven wind of Maalehu,
The smoke-laden wind of Kalauea.

There is no doubt in this enumeration an assertion of power over the forces the reciter calls by name, as a descendant of her who has transmitted to him the magic formula.

Just so the technician in fishing gear, bark-cloth making, or in canoe or house building, the two crafts specially practiced by chiefs, acquires a very minute nomenclature useful to the reciter in word debate or riddling. The classic example in Hawaiian song is the famous canoe-chant, which, in the legend of _Kana_, Uli uses in preparing the canoe for her grandsons' war expedition against the ravisher of Hina (called the Polynesian Helen of Troy) and which is said to be still employed for exorcism by sorcerers (_Kahuna_), of whom Uli is the patron divinity. The enumeration begins thus:

It is the double canoe of Kaumaielieli,
Keakamilo the outrigger,
Halauloa the body,
Luu the part under water,
Aukuuikalani the bow;

and so on to the names of the cross stick, the lashings, the sails, the bailing cup, the rowers in order, and the seat of each, his paddle, and his "seagoing loin cloth." There is no wordplay perceptible in this chant, but it is doubtful whether the object is to record a historical occurrence or rather to exhibit inspired craftsmanship, the process of enumeration serving as the intellectual test of an inherited gift from the gods.

Besides technical interests, the social and economic life of the people centers close attention upon the plant and animal life about them, as well as upon kinds of stone useful for working. Andrews enumerates 26 varieties of edible seaweed known to the Hawaiians. The reciters avail themselves of these well-known terms, sometimes for quick comparison, often for mere enumeration. It is interesting to see how, in the "Song of Creation," in listing plant and animal life according to its supposed order of birth--first, shellfish, then seaweed and grasses, then fishes and forests plants, then insects, birds, reptiles--wordplay is employed in carrying on the enumeration. We read:

"The Mano (shark) was born, the Moana was born in the sea and swam,
The Mau was born, the Maumau was born in the sea and swam,
The Nana was born, the Mana was born in the sea and swam."

and so on through Nake and Make, Napa and Nala, Pala and Kala, Paka (eel) and Papa (crab) and twenty-five or thirty other pairs whose signification is in most cases lost if indeed they are not entirely fictitious. Again, 16 fish names are paired with similar names of forest plants; for example:

"The Pahau was born in the sea,
Guarded by the Lauhau that grew in the forest."

"The Hee was born and lived in the sea,
Guarded by the Walahee that grew in the forest."

Here the relation between the two objects is evidently fixed by the chance likeness of name.

On the whole, the Hawaiian takes little interest in stars. The "canoe-steering star," to be sure, is useful, and the "net of Makalii" (the Pleiads) belongs to a well-known folk tale. But star stories do not appear in Hawaiian collections, and even sun and moon stories are rare, all belonging to the older and more mythical tales. Clouds, however, are very minutely observed, both as weather indicators and in the lore of signs, and appear often in song and story.[1]

Besides differentiating such visible phenomena, the Polynesian also thinks in parts of less readily distinguishable wholes. When we look toward the zenith or toward the horizon we conceive the distance as a whole; the Polynesian divides and names the space much as we divide our globe into zones. We have seen how he conceives a series of heavens above the earth, order in creation, rank in the divisions of men on earth and of gods in heaven. In the passage of time he records how the sun measures the changes from day to night; how the moon marks off the month; how the weather changes determine the seasons for planting and fishing through the year; and, observing the progress of human life from infancy to old age, he names each stage until "the staff rings as you walk, the eyes are dim like a rat's, they pull you along on the mat," or "they bear you in a bag on the back."

Clearly the interest aroused by all this nomenclature is emotional, not rational. There is too much wordplay. Utility certainly plays some part, but the prevailing stimulus is that which bears directly upon the idea of rank, some divine privilege being conceived in the mere act of naming, by which a supernatural power is gained over the object named. The names, as the objects for which they stand, come from the gods. Thus in the story of _Pupuhuluena_, the culture hero propitiates two fishermen into revealing the names of their food plants and later, by reciting these correctly, tricks the spirits into conceding his right to their possession. Thus he wins tuberous food plants for his people.

For this reason, exactness of knowledge is essential. The god is irritated by mistakes.[2] To mispronounce even casually the name of the remote relative of a chief might cost a man a valuable patron or even life itself. Some chiefs are so sacred that their names are taboo; if it is a word in common use, there is chance of that word dropping out of the language and being replaced by another.

Completeness of enumeration hence has cabalistic value. When the Hawaiian propitiates his gods he concludes with an invocation to the "forty thousand, to the four hundred thousand, to the four thousand"[3] gods, in order that none escape the incantation. Direction is similarly invoked all around the compass. In the art of verbal debate--called _hoopapa_ in Hawaii--the test is to match a rival's series with one exactly parallel in every particular or to add to a whole some undiscovered part.[4] A charm mentioned in folk tale is "to name every word that ends with _lau_." Certain numbers, too, have a kind of magic finality in themselves; for example, to count off an identical phrase by ten without missing a word is the charm by which Lepe tricks the spirits. In the _Kualii_, once more, Ku is extolled as the tenth chief and warrior:

The first chief, the second chief,
The third chief, the fourth chief,
The fifth chief, the sixth chief,
The seventh chief, the eighth chief,
The ninth, chief, the tenth chief is Ku,
Ku who stood, in the path of the rain of the heaven,
The first warrior, the second warrior,
The third warrior, the fourth warrior,
The fifth warrior, the sixth warrior,
The seventh warrior, the eighth warrior,
The ninth warrior, the tenth warrior
Is the Chief who makes the King rub his eyes,
The young warrior of all Maui.

And there follows an enumeration of the other nine warriors. A similar use is made of counting-out lines in the famous chant of the "Mirage of Mana" in the story of _Lono_, evidently with the idea of completing an inclusive series.

Counting-out formulae reappear in story-telling in such repetitive series of incidents as those following the action of the five sisters of the unsuccessful wooer in the _Laieikawai_ story. Here the interest develops, as in the lines from _Kualii_, an added emotional element, that of climax. The last place is given to the important character. Although everyone is aware that the younger sister is the most competent member of the group, the audience must not be deprived of the pleasure of seeing each one try and fail in turn before the youngest makes the attempt. The story-teller, moreover, varies the incident; he does not exactly follow his formula, which, however, it is interesting to note, is more fixed in the evidently old dialogue part of the story than in the explanatory action.

Story-telling also exhibits how the vital connection felt to exist between a person or object and the name by which it is distinguished, which gives an emotional value to the mere act of naming, is extended further to include scenes with which it is associated. The Hawaiian has a strong place sense, visible in his devotion to scenes familiar to his experience, and this is reflected in his language. In the _Laieikawai_ it appears in the plaints of the five sisters as they recall their native land. In the songs in the _Halemano_ which the lover sings to win his lady and the chant in _Lonoikamakahiki_ with which the disgraced favorite seeks to win back his lord, those places are recalled to mind in which the friends have met hardship together, in order, if possible, to evoke the same emotions of love and loyalty which were theirs under the circumstances described. Hawaiians of all classes, in mourning their dead, will recall vividly in a wailing chant the scenes with which their lost friend has been associated. I remember on a tramp in the hills above Honolulu coming upon the grass hut of a Hawaiian lately released from serving a term for manslaughter. The place commanded a fine view--the sweep of the blue sea, the sharp rugged lines of the coast, the emerald rice patches, the wide-mouthed valleys cutting the roots of the wooded hills. "It is lonely here?" we asked the man. "_Aole! maikai keia!_" ("No, the view is excellent") he answered.

The ascription of perfection of form to divine influence may explain the Polynesian's strong sense for beauty.[5] The Polynesian sees in nature the sign of the gods. In its lesser as in its more marvelous manifestations--thunder, lightning, tempest, the "red rain," the rainbow, enveloping mist, cloud shapes, sweet odors of plants, so rare in Hawaii, at least, or the notes of birds--he reads an augury of divine indwelling. The romances glow with delight in the startling effect of personal beauty upon the beholder--a beauty seldom described in detail save occasionally by similes from nature. In the _Laieikawai_ the sight of the heroine's beauty creates such an ecstasy in the heart of a mere countryman that he leaves his business to run all about the island heralding his discovery. Dreaming of the beauty of Laieikawai, the young chief feels his heart glow with passion for this "red blossom of Puna" as the fiery volcano scorches the wind that fans across its bosom. A divine hero must select a bride of faultless beauty; the heroine chooses her lover for his physical perfections. Now we can hardly fail to see that in all these cases the delight is intensified by the belief that beauty is godlike and betrays divine rank in its possessor. Rank is tested by perfection of face and form. The recognition of beauty thus becomes regulated by express rules of symmetry and surface. Color, too, is admired according to its social value. Note the delight in red, constantly associated with the accouterments of chiefs.

_Footnotes to Section III, 2: Nomenclature_

[Footnote 1: In the Hawaiian Annual, 1890, Alexander translates some notes printed by Kamakau in 1865 upon Hawaiian astronomy as related to the art of navigation. The bottom of a gourd represented the heavens, upon which were marked three lines to show the northern and southern limits of the sun's path, and the equator--called the "black shining road of Kane" and "of Kanaloa," respectively, and the "road of the spider" or "road to the navel of Wakea" (ancestor of the race). A line was drawn from the north star to Newe in the south; to the right was the "bright road of Kane," to the left the "much traveled road of Kanaloa." Within these lines were marked the positions of all the known stars, of which Kamakau names 14, besides 5 planets. For notes upon Polynesian astronomy consult Journal of the Polynesian Society, iv, 236. Hawaiian priestly hierarchies recognize special orders whose function it is to read the signs in the clouds, in dreams, or the flight of birds, or to practice some form of divination with the entrails of animals. In Hawaii, according to Fornander, the soothsayers constitute three of the ten large orders of priests, called Oneoneihonua, Kilokilo, and Nanauli, and these are subdivided into lesser orders. _Ike_, knowledge, means literally "to see with, the eyes," but it is used also to express mental vision, or knowledge with reference to the objective means by which such knowledge is obtained. So the "gourd of wisdom"--_ka ipu o ka ike_--which Laieikawai consults, brings distant objects before the eyes so that the woman "knows by seeing" what is going on below. Signs in the clouds are especially observed, both as weather indicators and to forecast the doings of chiefs. According to Westervelt's story of _Keaomelemele_, the lore is taught to mythical ancestors of the Hawaiian race by the gods themselves. The best analysis of South Sea Island weather signs is to be found in Erdland's "Marshall Insulaner," page 69. Early in the morning or in the evening is the time for making observations. Rainbows, _punohu_--doubtfully explained to me as mists touched by the end of a rainbow--and the long clouds which lie along the horizon, forecast the doings of chiefs. A pretty instance of the rainbow sign occurred in the recent history of Hawaii. When word reached Honolulu of the death of King Kalakaua, the throng pressed to the palace to greet their new monarch, and as Her Majesty Liliuokalani appeared upon the balcony to receive them, a rainbow arched across the palace and was instantly recognized as a symbol of her royal rank. In the present story the use of the rainbow symbol shows clumsy workmanship, since near its close the Sun god is represented as sending to his bride as her peculiar distinguishing mark the same sign, a rainbow, which has been hers from birth.]

[Footnote 2: Moerenhout (I, 501-507) says that the Areois society in Tahiti, one of whose chief objects was "to preserve the chants and songs of antiquity," sent out an officer called the "Night-walker," _Hare-po_, whose duty it was to recite the chants all night long at the sacred places. If he hesitated a moment it was a bad omen. "Perfect memory for these chants was a gift of god and proved that a god spoke through and inspired the reciter." If a single slip was made, the whole was considered useless.

Erdland relates that a Marshall Islander who died in 1906 remembered correctly the names of officers and scholars who came to the islands in the Chamisso party when he was a boy of 8 or 10.

Fornander notes that, in collecting Hawaiian chants, of the _Kualii_ dating from about the seventeenth century and containing 618 lines, one copy collected on Hawaii, another on Oahu, did not vary in a single line; of the _Hauikalani_, written just before Kamehameha's time and containing 527 lines, a copy from Hawaii and one from Maui differed only in the omission of a single word.

Tripping and stammering games were, besides, practiced to insure exact articulation. (See Turner, Samoa, p. 131; Thomson, pp. 16, 315.)]

[Footnote 3: Emerson, Unwritten Literature, p. 24 (note).]

[Footnote 4: This is well illustrated in Fornander's story of Kaipalaoa's disputation with the orators who gathered about Kalanialiiloa on Kauai. Say the men:

"Kuu moku la e kuu moku,
Moku kele i ka waa o Kaula,
Moku kele i ka waa, Nihoa,
Moku kele i ka waa, Niihau.
Lehua, Kauai, Molokai, Oahu,
Maui, Lanai, Kahoolawe,
Moloklni, Kauiki, Mokuhano,
Makaukiu, Makapu, Mokolii."

My island there, my island;
Island to which my canoe sails, Kaula,
Island to which my canoe sails, Nihoa,
Island to which my canoe sails, Niihau.
Lehua, Kauai, Molokai, Oahu,
Maui, Lanai, Kahoolawe,
Molokini, Kauiki, Mokuhano,
Makaukiu, Makapu, Mokolii.

"You are beaten, young man; there are no islands left. We have taken up the islands to be found, none left."

Says the boy:

"Kuu moku e, kuu moku,
O Mokuola, ulu ka ai,
Ulu ka niu, ulu ka laau,
Ku ka hale, holo ua holoholona."

Here is my island, my island
_Mokuola_, where grows food,
The cocoanut grows, trees grow,
Houses stand, animals run.

"There is an island for you. It is an island. It is in the sea."

(This is a small island off Hilo, Hawaii.)

The men try again:

"He aina hau kinikini o Kohala,
Na'u i helu a hookahi hau,
I e hiku hau keu.
O ke ama hau la akahi,
O ka iaku hau la alua,
O ka ilihau la akolu,
O ka laau hau la aha,
O ke opu hau la alima,
O ka nanuna hau la aone,
O ka hau i ka mauna la ahiku."

A land of many _hau_ trees is Kohala
Out of a single _hau_ tree I have counted out
And found seven _hau_.
The _hau_ for the outriggers makes one,
The _hau_ for the joining piece makes two,
The _hau_ bark makes three,
The _hau_ wood makes four,
The _hau_ bush makes five,
The large _hau_ tree makes six,
The mountain _hau_ makes seven.

"Say, young man, you will have no _hau_, for we have used it all. There is none left. If you find any more, you shall live, but if you fail you shall surely die. We will twist your nose till you see the sun at Kumukena. We will poke your eyes with the _Kahili_ handle, and when the water runs out, our little god of disputation shall suck it up--the god Kaneulupo."

Says the boy, "You full-grown men have found so many uses, you whose teeth are rotten with age, why can't I, a lad, find other uses, to save myself so that I may live. I shall search for some more hau, and if I fail you shall live, but if I find them you shall surely die."

"Aina hau kinikini o Kona,
Na'u i helu hookahi hau,
A ehiku hau keu.
O Honolohau la akahi,
O Lanihau la alua
O Punohau la akolu,
O Kahauloa la aha,
O Auhaukea la alima,
O Kahauiki la aono,
Holo kehau i ka waa kona la ahiku."

A land of many _hau_ trees is in _Kona_
Out of a single _hau_ I have counted one,
And found seven _hau_.
Honolahau makes one,
Lanihau makes two,
Punohau makes three,
Kahauloa makes four,
Auhaukea makes five,
Kahaniki makes six,
The Kehau that drives the canoe at Kona makes seven.

(All names of places in the Kona district.)

"There are seven _hau_, you men with rotten teeth."]

[Footnote 5: Thomson says that the Fijians differ from the Polynesians in their indifference to beauty in nature.]

3. ANALOGY: ITS PICTORIAL QUALITY

A second significant trait in the treatment of objective life, swiftness of analogy, affects the Polynesian in two ways: the first is pictorial and plays upon a likeness between objects or describes an idea or mood in metaphorical terms; the second is a mere linguistic play upon words. Much nomenclature is merely a quick picturing which fastens attention upon the special feature that attracts attention; ideas are naturally reinforced by some simple analogy. I recall a curious imported flower with twisted inner tube which the natives call, with a characteristic touch of daring drollery, "the intestines of the clergyman." Spanish moss is named from a prominent figure of the foreign community "Judge Dole's beard." Some native girls, braiding fern wreaths, called my attention to the dark, graceful fronds which grow in the shade and are prized for such work. "These are the natives," they said; then pointing slyly to the coarse, light ferns burned in the sun they added, "these are the foreigners." After the closing exercises of a mission school in Hawaii one of the parents was called upon to make an address. He said: "As I listen to the songs and recitations I am like one who walks through the forest where the birds are singing. I do not understand the words, but the sound is sweet to the ear." The boys in a certain district school on Hawaii call the weekly head inspection "playing the ukulele" in allusion to the literal interpretation of the name for the native banjo. These homely illustrations, taken from the everyday life of the people, illustrate a habit of mind which, when applied for conscious emotional effect, results in much charm of formal expression. The habit of isolating the essential feature leads to such suggestive names as "Leaping water," "White mountain," "The gathering place of the clouds," for waterfall or peak; or to such personal appellations as that applied to a visiting foreigner who had temporarily lost his voice, "The one who never speaks"; or to such a description of a large settlement as "many footprints."[1] The graphic sense of analogy applies to a mountain such a name as "House of the sun"; to the prevailing rain of a certain district the appellation "The rain with a pack on its back," "Leaping whale" or "Ghostlike"; to a valley, "The leaky canoe"; to a canoe, "Eel sleeping in the water." A man who has no brother in a family is called "A single coconut," in allusion to a tree from which hangs a single fruit.[2]

This tendency is readily illustrated in the use of synonyms. _Oili_ means "to twist, roll up;" it also means "to be weary, agitated, tossed about in mind." _Hoolala_ means "to branch out," as the branches of a tree; it is also applied in sailing to the deflection from a course. _Kilohana_ is the name given to the outside decorated piece of tapa in a skirt of five layers; it means generally, therefore, "the very best" in contrast to that which is inferior. _Kuapaa_ means literally "to harden the back" with oppressive work; it is applied to a breadfruit parched on the tree or to a rock that shows itself above water. Lilolilo means "to spread out, expand as blossom from bud;" it also applies to an open-handed person. _Nee_ may mean "to hitch along from one place to another," or "to change the mind." _Palele_ means "separate, put somewhere else when there is no place vacant;" it also applies to stammering. These illustrations gathered almost at random may be indefinitely multiplied. I recall a clergyman in a small hamlet on Hawaii who wished to describe the character of the people of that place. Picking up a stone of very close grain of the kind used for pounding and called _alapaa_, literally, "close-grained stone," he explained that because the people of that section were "tight" (stingy) they were called _Kaweleau alapaa_. This ready imitativeness, often converted into caricature, enters into the minutest detail of life and is the clew to many a familiar proverb like that of the canoe on the coral reef quoted in the text.[3] The chants abound in such symbols. Man is "a long-legged fish" offered to the gods. Ignorance is the "night of the mind." The cloud hanging over Kaula is a bird which flies before the wind[4]--

The blackbird begged,
The bird of Kaula begged,
Floating up there above Waahila.

The coconut leaves are "the hair of the trees, their long locks." Kailua district is "a mat spread out narrow and gray."

The classic example of the use of such metaphor in Hawaiian song is the famous passage in the _Hauikalani_ in which chiefs at war are compared with a cockfight, the favorite Hawaiian pastime[5] being realistically described in allusion to Keoua's wars on Hawaii:

Hawaii is a cockpit; the trained cocks fight on the ground.
The chief fights--the dark-red cock awakes at night for battle;
The youth fights valiantly--Loeau, son of Keoua.
He whets his spurs, he pecks as if eating;
He scratches in the arena--this Hilo--the sand of Waiolama.

* * * * *

He is a well-fed cock. The chief is complete,
Warmed in the smokehouse till the dried feathers rattle,
With changing colors, like many-colored paddles, like piles of
polished Kahili.
The feathers rise and fall at the striking of the spurs.

Here the allusions to the red color and to eating suggest a chief. The feather brushes waved over a chief and the bright-red paddles of his war fleet are compared to the motion of a fighting cock's bright feathers, the analogy resting upon the fact that the color and the motion of rising and falling are common to all three.

This last passage indicates the precise charm of Polynesian metaphor. It lies in the singer's close observation of the exact and characteristic truth which suggests the likeness, an exactness necessary to carry the allusion with his audience, and which he sharpens incessantly from the concrete facts before him. Kuapakaa sings:

The rain in the winter comes slanting,
Taking the breath away, pressing down the hair,
Parting the hair in the middle.

The chants are full of such precise descriptions, and they furnish the rich vocabulary of epithet employed in recalling a place, person, or object. Transferred to matters of feeling or emotion, they result in poetical comparisons of much charm. Sings Kuapakaa (Wise's translation):

The pointed clouds have become fixed in the heavens,
The pointed clouds grow quiet like one in pain before childbirth,
Ere it comes raining heavily, without ceasing.
The umbilicus of the rain is in the heavens,
The streams will yet be swollen by the rain.

Hina's song of longing for her lost lover in _Laieikawai_ should be compared with the lament of Laukiamanuikahiki when, abandoned by her lover, she sees the clouds drifting in the direction he has taken:

The sun is up, it is up;
My love is ever up before me.
It is causing me great sorrow, it is pricking me in the side,
For love is a burden when one is in love,
And falling tears are its due.

How vividly the mind enters into this analogy is proved, by its swift identification with the likeness presented. Originally this identification was no doubt due to ideas of magic. In romance, life in the open--in the forests or on the sea--has taken possession of the imagination. In the myths heroes climb the heavens, dwelling half in the air; again they are amphibian like their great lizard ancestors. In the _Laieikawai_, as in so many stories, note how much of the action takes place on or in the sea--canoeing, swimming, or surfing. In less humanized tales the realization is much more fantastic. To the Polynesian, mind such figurative sayings as "swift as a bird" and "swim like a fish" mean a literal transformation, his sense of identity being yet plastic, capable of uniting itself with whatever shape catches the eye. When the poet Marvel says--

Casting the body's vest aside,
My soul into the boughs does glide;
There, like a bird, it sits and sings,
Then whets and combs its silver wings,
And, till prepared for longer flight,
Waves in its plumes the various light--

he is merely expressing a commonplace of primitive mental experience, transformation stories being of the essence of Polynesian as of much primitive speculation about the natural objects to which his eye is drawn with wonder and delight.

_Footnotes to Section III, 3: Analogy_

[Footnote 1: Turner, Samoa, p. 220.]

[Footnote 2: Ibid.; Moerenhout, I, 407-410.]

[Footnote 3: Turner, Samoa, pp. 216-221; Williams and Calvert, I, p. 110.]

[Footnote 4: Williams and Calvert, I, 118.]

[Footnote 5: Moerenhout, II, 146.]

4. THE DOUBLE MEANING; PLAYS ON WORDS

Analogy is the basis of many a double meaning. There is, in fact, no lyric song describing natural scenery that may not have beneath it some implied, often indelicate, allusion whose riddle it takes an adroit and practiced mind to unravel.

This riddling tendency of figurative verse seems to be due to the aristocratic patronage of composition, whose tendency was to exalt language above the comprehension of the common people, either by obscurity, through ellipsis and allusion, or by saying one thing and meaning another. A special chief's language was thus evolved, in which the speaker might couch his secret resolves and commands unsuspected by those who stood within earshot. Quick interpretation of such symbols was the test of chiefly rank and training. On the other hand, the wish to appear innocent led him to hide his meaning in a commonplace observation. Hence nature and the objects and actions of everyday life were the symbols employed. For the heightened language of poetry the same chiefly strain was cultivated--the allusion, metaphor, the double meaning became essential to its art; and in the song of certain periods a play on words by punning and word linking became highly artificial requirements.[1]

Illustrations of this art do not fall upon a foreign ear with the force which they have in the Polynesian, because much of the skill lies in tricks with words impossible to translate, and often the jest depends upon a custom or allusion with which the foreigner is unfamiliar. It is for this reason that such an art becomes of social value, because only the chief who keeps up with the fashion and the follower who hangs upon the words of his chief can translate the allusion and parry the thrust or satisfy the request. In a Samoan tale a wandering magician requests in one village "to go dove catching," and has the laugh on his simple host because he takes him at his word instead of bringing him a wife. In a Tongan story[2] the chief grows hungry while out on a canoe trip, and bids his servant, "Look for a banana stalk on the weather side of the boat." As this is the side of the women, the command meant "Kill a woman for me to eat." The woman designed for slaughter is in this case wise enough to catch his meaning and save herself and child by hiding under the canoe. In Fornander's story a usurper and his accomplice plan the moment for the death of their chief over a game of _konane_, the innocent words which seem to apply to the game being uttered by the conspirators with a more sinister meaning. The language of insults and opprobrium is particularly rich in such double meanings. The pig god, wishing to insult Pélé, who has refused his advances, sings of her, innocently enough to common ears, as a "woman pounding _noni_." Now, the _noni_ is the plant from which red dye is extracted; the allusion therefore is to Pélé's red eyes, and the goddess promptly resents the implication.

It is to this chiefly art of riddling that we must ascribe the stories of riddling contests that are handed down in Polynesian tales. The best Hawaiian examples are perhaps found in Fornander's _Kepakailiula_. Here the hero wins supremacy over his host by securing the answer to two riddles--"The men that stand, the men that lie down, the men that are folded," and "Plaited all around, plaited to the bottom, leaving an opening." The answer is in both cases a house, for in the first riddle "the timbers stand, the batons lie down, the grass is folded under the cords"; in the second, the process of thatching is described in general terms. In the story of _Pikoiakaala_, on the other hand; the hero puzzles his contestants by riddling with the word "rat." This word riddling is further illustrated in the story of the debater, Kaipalaoa, already quoted. His opponents produce this song:

The small bird chirps; it shivers in the rain, in Puna, at Keaau,
at Iwainalo,

and challenge him to "find another _nalo_." Says the boy:

The crow caw caws; it shines in the rain. In _Kona_, at _Honalo_,
it is hidden (_nalo_).

Thus, by using _nalo_ correctly in the song in two ways, he has overmatched his rivals.