sous who were similarly afflicted; and many of the natives. overwheuned with superstitious fears, tried to vaccinate them

But vaccination did not save multitudes: there is evidence that it procured their death. The Polynesian" of the 13th of August remarks :

It appears that even vaccination will not protect the enervated Kanakas from disease. The marshal of Honolulu reports that he had found about seven eighths of those attacked had been vaccinated. He then presented a paper, giving the number of persons taken with the disease who had been vac einated, and the number cured. We give only a summary: whole number vaccinated taken sick, 477; whole number cured, 209."

And what was the " Board of Health" doing all this time? While the epidemie was sweeping over Oahu, and laying multitudes in their graves, Messrs. JUDD and ARMSTRONG-Who were the leading spirits of this "Board"-permitted vessels to leave Honolulu, and carry the disease to the other islands in the group. This was scientific and philanthropic, was it not? But this was the way in which the small-pox was conveyed to Ka-wai-hae, and thence over the island of Hawaii. And while the foreign residents of Honolulu were spending their time and money to stay the march of this fearful pestilence, which was threatening to annihilate the people and sweep off their commerce, and while the small sum of "two thousand dollars" would have caused every native on the group to be properly vaccinated, and thereby have saved thousands of lives, these two philanthropic gentlemen controlled the treasury, and the entreaties and anxieties of true philanthropists were trodden under foot by them. It was not until the destroying angel had swept past that their superior wisdom undertook to devise means for the public safety.

It could not be expected that the foreign population could pass by these outrages and say nothing. Neither did they. A storm of public indignation burst forth. On the 20th of July, 1853, a public notice was sent forth, calling upon every

"COMMITTEE OF THIRTEEN."

395

friend of justice to petition for the final removal of the Ministers of Finance and Public Instruction. That was the most important event that has ever occurred in the Sandwich Islands since the overthrow of idolatry in 1819. It was the dawn of freedom's birth-day to the native and foreign population. It was the means of convening three public meetings for free discussion of individual rights and opinions by the best citizens on the group. As that third meeting of independent citizens seriously concerns the United States not less than the Sandwich Islands, I give an outline of its proceedings in this connection:

"At a public meeting of the foreign residents, called by the "Committee of Thirteen," to be held in the court-house in this city on the evening of August 15, the following officers were elected: JOHN MONTGOMERY, President; FRANK SPENCER and PIERCE HAGGERTY, Vice-presidents; and WILLIAM Ladd and J. M. SMITH, Secretaries.

The chairman of the committee of five, to present the petition to the king, reported that they had discharged that duty. “J. D. BLAIR, Esq., then moved the adoption of the following resolutions :

Resolved, That we, the independent party, continue our organization, and the committee of thirteen continue to act until the purposes of this party are attained.

“Resolved, That the appointments heretofore made by the committee of thirteen to fill vacancies are hereby ratified, and that the committee be empowered to fill all vacancies that may hereafter occur.

“Resolved, That we will sustain the committee of thirteen in all measures it may deem expedient for accomplishing the object of this party.

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'J. MONTGOMERY, Esq., being called, addressed the meeting in earnest support of the resolutions.

"Dr. NEWCOMBE then followed in a detailed and successful review of statements which appeared in the last issue of the Polynesian, and boldly challenged a contradiction of his statement of facts as opposed to G. P. JUDD and RICH'D ARMSTRONG.

"C. C. HARRIS, Police Justice, addressed the meeting in opposition to the proceedings and purpose of the independent party. Mr. HARRIS read an extract from the petition, to which he obtained access in the office of the Minister of the Interior, and then intimated that an idea of treason or revolution was involved in those proceedings.

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Mr. BLAIR replied with much effect to Mr. HARRIS, and charged him with being the first to introduce revolutionary or treasonable ideas or designs, and also of having improper possession of an extract from the petition.

"A. B. BATES, District Attorney (and brother-in-law of G. P. JUDD), during a period of thirty-five minutes, made a variety of remarks, designed to screen and defend the obnoxious ministers, to divert the attention and purposes of the party, and to prevent the adoption of the resolutions. He then descended to indulge in some ungentlemanly personal remarks respecting all the officers of the meeting, and also some of the speakers and members of the committee of thirteen.

"J. M. SMITH being then called upon, in the course of his pungent observations, charged home upon certain ministers certain offensive acts which came to his knowledge while acting in the last Legislature.

"The resolutions having been duly seconded and ably supported, were enthusiastically adopted, upon which the meeting adjourned."

I shall enter more fully into this subject on a subsequent page. I have already referred to the testimony of competent physicians as to the sufferings inflicted upon the people by incompetent men; but, in all probability, the most prominent evil has resulted in the quackery of native doctors, if they may be dignified by such an appellation. With their charms and incantations, together with their powerful medicines, it is undoubtedly true that they have destroyed more lives than they have saved.

It is not improbable that the common "neglect of the proper means to preserve life are the remains of superstition among the people. They appear to have but little sense of the value

ORIGIN OF THE SANDWICH ISLANDERS. 397

of life. They can lie down and die the easiest of any people with which I am acquainted. I have pretty good reason for the belief that they sometimes die through fear, believing that some person having the power to pray them to death is in the act of doing so, and the imagination is so wrought up that life yields to intense fear.”*

The existence of this epidemic was an effectual barrier to my farther progress over Hawaii. I had purposed to continue my rambles from Ka-wai-hae to Kealakekua Bay-the deathplace of Cook; from thence across the spur of Mauna Loa to Kilauea and to Hilo. This was a plan I had long cherished, but the natives were falling around me like withered leaves in the forest; I could get nothing done at any cost, and I could not finish my journey alone. Keenly did I feel the disappointment, but there was no remedy; so I resolved on finishing my tour by a few concluding observations.

CHAPTER XXXII.

CONCLUSION.

Origin of the Sandwich Islanders.-The Theory sustained by Tradition.-Habits and Customs, Physical Organization and Language. -Their Past and Present Condition: Social, Political, and Religious. - Probable Destiny of the Race. - Prospective History of Christian Institutions.-Cause for Congratulation.—One Cause of a grand Failure.—The English Language the only best Channel of Civilization.

THERE is a sort of melancholy pleasure in a patient investigation of the origin of ancient races. When there are welldefined landmarks to aid the researches of the antiquary, his task is easy; otherwise it is like threading his way along the galleries of buried nations in search of some one whose resting-place is marked by no monumental marble.

Such is the position of a tourist over the Sandwich group.

"Answers to Questions," p. 49.

There are no Giant Causeways or Gothic turrets to mark the footsteps of a great and ancient race, or to indicate that the arts and sciences ever flourished there. The tourist knows that he is in a land where battles have been fought, and human victims offered to imaginary gods, and where the very genius of despotism has swayed its sceptre—a land of song in old times, and of ancient poets and minstrels, who wandered over their mountains in the train of warlike monarchs, in the same way as did the heroes of OSSIAN. He passes over the silent graves of extinct generations, that repose where every stream, crag, hill, valley, and object has its associational legends, and his very soul overflows with a poetry of romance, with a torrent of impulses that language is too poor to clothe in words. There are no histories carefully treasured up from past ages to tell him how multitudes have lived and died, and passed away forever, and how mighty earthquakes have rent the huge mountains asunder, when rivers of lava spread desolation and death in their pathway, and volcanic lightnings painted a miniature hell on the bosom of the midnight sky. There are none of these records to guide the traveler. He is placed amid the giant landmarks of Nature, and they, and tradition, and philosophical analogy must guide his decisions.

Unlettered as the Hawaiians have always been, there is a very striking coincidence between their rugged traditions and the operations of natural causes and effects. The old Hawaiians attributed their own origin, as also that of their islands, to the direct interposition of their gods.

Native historians affirm that "the name of the first man was Kahiko (ancient), and the name of the first woman was Kupulanakahau. Their son's name was Wakea. Among the first settlers from abroad were Kukalaniehu and his wife Kahakauakoko, who had a daughter by the name of Papa. kea and Papa were the first progenitors of the Hawaiian race, both of the chiefs and common people."*

*Hawaiian Spectator, vol. ii., p. 211, 212.

Wa

There are many fabulous things related of Papa. One is, that she was the mother of these islands. Another, that Kuhauakahi was