PUBLICATION OF LAWS, AND OF THE GOSPEL.

323

no longer strangers and foreigners but fellow citizens with us; and they united joyfully with us and others in celebrating the Savior's bleeding love.

"We would adore the matchless goodness of the Lord of Heaven and earth for this display of his mercy towards us and towards the people of these isles of the sea. May all the inhabitants of the isles soon rejoice and be glad in him. While the friends of Zion take courage from the evidence of the Divine blessing on the preaching of the Gospel in heathen lands, let them left up their hearts in thanksgiving for the past, and in unceasing supplication for a more general effusion of the Spirit here and throughout the world."

Two days before this Sabbath scene, the chiefs proclaimed and caused to be published, written laws against murder, theft, and adultery. The same week, the first sheet of the translation of Luke's Gospel was printed. The Gospels by Matthew, Mark, and John, had already been sent to the United States to be printed there for the Hawaiian people, under the supervision of Mr. Loomis.

At the same time, the friends of our cause, in the United States, hailing the evidence of progress, saw it to be reasonable to reinforce our mission, though the outfit and passage of another reinforcement deemed by the Board necessary, would cost, at once, some $8,000. Whether the Christian public would advance with the Providence of God in the work of missions was yet to be settled, as the lamented Dr. Worcester had said in 1820, after sending forth the missions to the Sandwich Islands and Palestine:

"The question is to be decided, and it may be decided soon, whether there is in this country, Christian benevolence enough-sufficiently undivided, unobstructed, and unrestrained-sufficiently resembling the charity which descended from heaven-to bear any proportionable part in the great work of evangelizing the heathen."*

By the same pen it was stated in the same year, in respect to the first ten years of the operations of the American Board-" In these ten years, there has been paid from the treasury of the Board the total sum of $201,600. For the Missions to the East, Bombay, and Ceylon, just about $100,000-for the Missions to the American Aborigines $51,000-for the Mission to the Sandwich Islands (including the outfit, passage, and settlement in 1819, 1820) $10,461 80-for the Palestine Mission $2,350 for the Foreign Mission'school $17,340--and for various subordinate and contingent objects and purposes $20,000."

It may be added that subsequent to 1820, there were paid out from the same treasury for the mission to the Sandwich Islands, in the years ending August; in 1821, $669 70°; in 1822, $1,071; in 1823, including the outfit and passage of the first reinforcement, $12,074 67; in 1824, $6,746 30; in 1825, $9,764 89; in 1826, $10,241 94; in 1827, 9,761 31-making the cost of the mission for its first eight years (besides the gifts of private friends and natives), $60,791 61.

CHAPTER XIII.

NINTH YEAR OF THE MISSION AND FIFTH OF KAAHUMANU.— 1828.

Letters for the American Board from the queen and her sister-The Board to Kauikeaouli-Second reinforcement-Their arrival and reception-Capt. Beechey's letters-State of the field at Maui-Death of Mrs. Bishop-Letter of Gov. Adams -Revival in Kona-Departure of Mr. Ely-Sending away a Missionary's childExposure of Messrs. Bishop and Ruggles.

IN the commencement of a new year, I will take further notice of the measures for increasing evangelical light, counteracting iniquity, and encouraging the nation to go forward in their improvement.

Soon after the difficulties in respect to the Daniel and the John Palmer, Kaahumanu wrote to her friend, the Secretary of the American Board :

"My affectionate regards to you, Mr. Evarts, and to all our kindred in that country, on account of the great blessing you have sent us— the light-the Word of God. We have given our hearts to God. We rejoice in the great salvation. Have ye good will towards us, and pray ye to God for us, that we may all stand firm together, as one in the following of Jesus Christ; that you and we may all be saved by the Messiah, the Redeemer.

"I pity Mr. Bishop on account of his companion, the only one of yours who has fallen here. Grief for his companion and compassion for his children.

"ELISABETH KAHUMANU."

Her honored sister wrote as follows:

"OAHU, March 12, 1828. "MR. EVARTS:-May you live to a good old age. I affectionately salute you and all the brethren; this is my thought for you which 1 communicate to you. I am learning the holy Word of Christ and his law and his good ordinances. I have, in a small degree, acquired a very little. I have not yet acquired much. But the desire of my heart goes out to beg of him night and day, that my soul may obtain everlasting salvation in heaven. My desire and my mind, and my thoughts, I have bound up in a bundle and committed to him; and his word and his law are what I now replace in my heart, that my house may be fully peopled by his powerful spirit, his unceasing love, and his unfeigned goodness, and his long suffering mercy.

"O may we all be saved by him from the rising of the sun to the setting of the sun.

RELIGIOUS INTEREST AT KAUAI.

337

The next day they reached Hilo, and were cordially welcomed by Mr. and Mrs. Goodrich, and by Gov. Adams. The latter was sojourning in that part of the island to superintend the building of a church, on which many of the people were employed; and also to make preparation for the building of a saw-mill in the heavy forest at the base of Mauua-kea, some fifteen miles back of Waiakea, both of which objects he accomplished.

Mr. Clark engaged particularly in teaching a class of teachers, enrolling the names of eighty from different parts of that extensive missionary district, more than eighty miles in length, embracing Hilo and Puna. They were poor, and not having the means of supporting themselves steadily at Waiakea, could not attend very constantly. There was a pleasant attention to religion. Our houses," says Mr. Clark, "were frequently thronged by persons who wished to tell their thoughts, and inquire what they should do to be saved." Such was the state of the people throughout the group at that period, wherever there were missionaries to attend to them.

Messrs. Whitney and Gulick, at Kauai, thus described the state of their field, which five years before had been in warlike

commotion :

"There are seventy-four schools on this island, taught by as many native teachers. The school-houses are generally much the best and most spacious buildings in their respective villages. Several of them are at least eighty feet long, and thirty-six broad. The people seldom remain longer than two hours in schools. They usually assemble twice a day; sometimes at six o'clock in the morning, but more generally at eight, and again between three and four in the afternoon. The teachers are appointed by the missionaries after examination, and in case of improper conduct, they are rejected by the same authority. They have generally been supported, or nearly so, by the head-men in their respective neighborhoods. This has been done by the Governor's orders. He has recently directed that there be given to each teacher a piece of land, from which, with a little labor, he may obtain a supply of food. As a body, the teachers are the most moral and most intelligent young men on the island: and they appear to be usually respected and esteemed by the people. When persons from a distant village, or those with whom we are unacquainted, wish to be married, it is customary for them to bring their teacher to testify that they are not already married, or that such a connexion is not on other accounts unlawful."

In July, Mr. W. writes concerning the people:

"I have now work enough, and that of the most delightful kind. It is pointing sinners to the Lamb of God, and conducting pilgrims along the road to glory. For several weeks there has been an unusual attention to religion here. Our public meetings are usually crowded to overflowing.

"In most persons there appears to be a spirit of inquiry; in many, a deep and aweful sense of the presence of God, and of their own sinfulness. Some are rejoicing in the Savior's love.

338

EARLY TEMPERANCE OF KAUAI.

"My house, whenever I am disengaged, is surrounded with the anxious, so that I find it impossible to converse with all of them personally. I am much impressed, at times, with the simple, unaffected relation given by natives, of the operation of the Holy Spirit on their minds. A case I will relate. A young man whom I had never known as interested in religion, called upon me, as he said, to inquire. Having seated himself by my side, he said to me, with an agitated frame and a look I can never forget,' What means this? For weeks past I have had a load upon me which troubles me much. By day and by night it follows me, so that I cannot sleep nor rest. I have tried to get rid of it. I have prayed to God to take it away; but it continues here.' Then pulling the Gospel of Luke out of his pocket, he pointed to the twenty-fourth verse of the sixteenth chapter, and said: There is my load; oh, my soul! to that unquenchable fire I fear I must go.' His voice and whole frame were now so agitated as to render him unable to articulate. When I told him that the Savior, whose mercy alone had long kept him from that place of torment, was now ready to take away his load, and deliver his soul from distress and perdition, he seemed a little comforted, and said, ' To him, then, I will go.'

While the missionaries were regarded as benefactors and guides, and the governor and his wife were favorable to the object of the mission, and the Spirit of God obviously present, it might be expected that the cause of the Sabbath and of temperance should receive some attention. Mr. Gulick says:

"The people are required to sanctify the Lord's day. They generally believe the Sabbath to be a divine institution, and consequently, that it ought to be sacredly observed. The natives are prohibited from all commerce in ardent spirits, and from using it, except as a medicine. This regulation has been in force a considerable time, and I believe is scldom violated; nor am I aware that it is esteemed burdensome. The consequence is, that I have not seen an intoxicated native, nor heard of one; neither have I known of any quarrelling among them, with one single exception, during my residence in the island."

President Humphrey gave it as his opinion, a few years since, "that if any man in the Parliament of Great Britain should move to dispense with licensing the traffic in ardent spirits, the Chancellor of the Exchequer would annihilate him." But thousands of the Hawaiians, within less than the period of a generation after they began to be instructed in morals and religion, came to the just conclusion that, encouraging the manufacture, sale, and use of distilled liquor as a drink, was wrong, both in rulers and subjects. Many a community in different parts of the United States, in France, and other civilized countries, cannot show a district school-house for the purpose of common school instruction and the occasional worship of God, where the settled or travelling preacher can assemble the people to hear the Gospel; yet throughout the Sandwich Islands, in ten years after the mission was commenced, there was scarcely a neighborhood where such an accommodation could not be found, or where it was not, more or less, used to good purpose.

GOVERNOR BOKI AND INTEMPERANCE.

339

The governor's wife, Amelia, made herself very interesting, and worthy of her station, not only in her general influence in favor of the instruction of the Islanders, but by collecting and personally instructing a school of forty children, from four to eight years of age. This was a service for which she received no pecuniary compensation, but so far as she gratified the feelings of benevolence towards the needy, she doubtless found a higher satisfaction, far, than if the parents of these children had paid her in silver and gold, the ordinary wages for teaching a primary school. At one examination she gave a calico dress to each of twentyfour females in a class with herself, and the governor distributed among twenty-five teachers, clothing to the amount of $250.

Mr. Gulick, in giving a deliberate judgment on the causes of the desire for books and instruction, which was so extensive, and in some respects truly wonderful, says, "When I consider the extreme degradation and ignorance, and the proverbial indolence of the people, this eagerness to obtain books, especially portions of the Word of God, and to know something of their contents, seems as evidently the work of God, as any other circumstance connected with this mission. And I think it equally manifest that the government has had a very important agency in producing the present state of feeling."

The kindness of many chiefs in encouraging the people to learn, was wonderful, and the more so, if they still intended to oppress them.

The course of Gov. Boki was unlike that of the chiefs generally, who professed a regard to the cause of Christianity. He set up a store and tavern in Honolulu, and encouraged the manufacture, sale, and use of intoxicating liquors, and tried to introduce a measure which he might have borrowed from some city of Italy, or corrupt branch of the civilized family of nations-a measure for raising money by licensing prostitution, as well as by the traffic in intoxicating liquors, in both contrary to the best interests of the people, whatever claim the self-indulgent from other countries might make for the liberty.

He was disposed to lease land for the purpose of producing rum at the Islands, but this Kaahumanu resolutely, and for the most part, successfully prevented; and, so far as I know, the policy of the country does not allow the product of leasehold land to be distilled.

To increase the production of intoxicating liquors, Boki, conforming rather to foreign customs than to the better policy of Kaahumanu, leased to a company of traders a building in Honolulu, which Kalanimoku, to encourage the growth and manufacture of sugar, had, before his death, built for a sugar-house. By an adroit metamorphosis, the company converted the sugar-house into a distillery, as if disposed to infix a gangrene or a consuming cancer in the heart of the nation. The principal reliance for supplying the distillery with material was the sugar-cane.

But