CHAPTER XXX
WHAT HIIAKA SAW FROM THE HEIGHT OF POHA-KEA
To return now to Hiiaka, who, after a hot climb, is standing on the summit of Poha-kea; she is gazing with rapt and clear vision far away in the direction of her own home-land, her moku lehua, in Puna. Her eyes, under the inspiration of the moment, disregard the ocean foreground, on whose gently heaving bosom might be seen the canoe that holds Lohiau and Wahine-oma'o snailing along to its appointed rendezvous. Her mind is busy interpreting the unusual signs written in the heavens: a swelling mountainous mass of flame-shot clouds, boiling up from some hidden source. It spells ruin and desolation--her own forest-parks blasted and fire-smitten; but, saddest and most heart-rending of all is the thought that her own Hopoe, the beautiful, the accomplished, the generous, the darling of her heart--Hopoe has been swallowed up in the rack. Hopoe, whose accepted emblem and favorite poetical metamorphosis was a tall lehua tree in full blossom, is now a scarred rock teetotumed back and forth by the tides and waves of the ocean. This thought, however much she would put it aside, remained to fester in her heart.
(We omit at this point a considerable number of mele which are ascribed to Hiiaka and declared to have been sung by her while occupying this mountain perch at Poha-kea. Application to them of the rule that requires conformity to a reasonable standard of relevancy to the main purpose of the narrative results in their exclusion.)
The song next given--by some dubbed a pule, because of its serious purpose, no doubt--seems to be entitled to admission to the narrative:
Aluna au a Poha-kea, Ku au, nana ia Puna: Po Puna i ka ua awaawa; Pohina Puna i ka ua noenoe; Hele ke a i kai o ka La-hiku o a'u lehua, O a'u lehua i aina [351] ka manu; I lahui [352] ai a kapu. Aia la, ke huki'a [353] la i kai o Nana-huki-- Hula le'a wale i kai o Nana-huki, e!
TRANSLATION
On the heights of Poha-kea I stand and look forth on Puna: Puna, pelted with bitter rain, Veiled with a downpour black as night! Gone, gone are my forests, lehuas Whose bloom once gave the birds nectar! Yet they were insured with a promise! Look, how the fire-fiends flit to and fro! A merry dance for them to the sea, Down to the sea at Nana-huki!
Hiiaka now pays attention to the doings of the people on the canoe in the offing. It is necessary to explain that, on landing at Mokuleia, she had ordered her two companions to continue their voyage and meet her on the other side of Cape Kaena whose pointed beak lay close at hand. Lohiau, nothing loath--a pretty woman was company enough for him--turned the prow of the canoe seaward and resumed his paddle. After passing the cape, the ocean calmed, making the work of steering much less arduous. Now it was that Lohiau, feeling the warm blood of young manhood swell the cockles of his heart and finding opportunity at hand, made ardent love to his attractive voyage-companion. He pressed nose and lip against her's and used every argument to bring her to accept his point of view.
Wahine-oma'o had a mind of her own and though not at all averse to love and its doings and though very much drawn to this lover in particular, she decidedly objected to compromising her relations with Hiiaka, but above all, with the dread mistress of the Volcano, with whom she must ere long make reckoning. Like Pele, Wahine-oma'o permitted the kisses of Lohiau for a time, but, knowing that passion grows by what it feeds on, she presently cut short his rations and told him to behave himself, enforcing her denial with the unanswerable argument that she was well persuaded that they would be seen by Hiiaka. It was even so. It was worse. Hiiaka did not content herself with throwing temptation before Lohiau, as one might place raw meat before a hungry dog; by some witchery of psychologic power she stirred him up to do and dare, yet at the same time she impelled Wahine-oma'o to accept, but only a certain degree, for she carefully set bounds to their conduct. And this, be it understood, is but the opening act of a campaign in which Hiiaka resolves to avenge herself on Pele.
When at length Hiiaka centered her attention on the actions of the people in the canoe, it needed but a glance to tell her that the contagium planted in the soil of Lohiau's mind had worked to a charm. Her own description--though in figures that seem high-wrought and foreign to our imaginations--had better tell the tale:
Aluna au o Poha-kea, Wehe ka ilio [354] i kona kapa; Hanai alualu [355] i ke kula o Miki-kala, [356] I ke kula o Puha-maló[356] Hakaká, kipikipi o Kai-a-ulu [357] me ke kanáka; Ua ku'i-ku'i wale a ha'ina [358] na ihu; Ua ka i ka u me ka waimaka, I ke kula o Lualua-lei, [359] e! Ku'u lei aloha no olua no, e!
TRANSLATION
I stand ahigh on Poha-kea; The dog of storm strips off his robe; A zephyr fans yon heated plain of Miki-kala and Puha-maló:-- Wild strife 'tween the man and the Sea breeze: I see noses flattened, broken, Fountains become of water and tears! This my garland of love to you two!
Hiiaka's voice had the precious quality of carrying her words and making them audible to a great distance, when she so willed. Her song, therefore, did not, on this occasion, waste itself in the wilderness of space. The caution it imposed had its effect. Lohiau and Wahine-oma'o calmed their passionate contentions and proceeded discreetly on their way. Having passed Kalae-loa, [360] their canoe swung into that inverted arc of Oahu's coastline, in the middle of which glisten, like two parted rows of white teeth, the coral bluffs that were the only guard at the mouth of Pearl Lochs.
Before descending from her vantage ground on Pohakea, Hiiaka indulged her fancy in a song that was of a different strain. Looking towards Hilo, she describes the rivers, swollen by heavy rains, rushing impetuously along in bounding torrents, while men and women leap into the wild current and are lifted on its billows as by the ocean waves:
A makani Kua-mú [361] lehua ko uka; Ke ho'o-wa'a-wa'a a'e la E uä i Hana-kahi, [362] e-e: Ke uä la, uä mai la Hilo A moku kahawai, piha akú la Na hale Lehua [363] a ke kai, e-e!
TRANSLATION
Kua-mú pays toll to the forests-- Cloud-columns that veer and sway, Freighted with rain for Hilo, The Hilo of Hana-kahi. The channels are full to the brim-- A tide that will flood ocean's caverns, The home of the mermaid Lehua.
After a moment's pause she resumed, though in quite a different strain:
Aia no ke 'kua la i uka; Ke hoá la i ka papa a enaena, A pulelo [364] mai ka ohi'a o ka lua; Maewa [365] ke po'o, pu'u, newa i ka makani, I ka hoonaue ia e ka awaawa, e-e!
TRANSLATION
The god is at work in the hills; She has fired the plain oven-hot; The forest-fringe of the pit is aflame;-- Fire-tongues, fire-globes, that sway in the wind-- The fierce bitter breath of the Goddess!
As the canoe drew near to the appointed rendezvous at Pu'u-loa, Hiiaka lifted her voice in a chanting song addressed to Lohiau and Wahine-oma'o:
Ku'u aikane i ke awa lau [366] o Pu'uloa, Mai ke kula o Pe'e-kaua, [367] ke noho oe, E noho kaua e kui, e lei i ka pua o ke kauno'a, [368] I ka pua o ke akuli-kuli, [369] o ka wili-wili; [370] O ka iho'na o Kau-pe'e i Kane-hili, [371] Ua hili [372] au; akahi no ka hili o ka la pomaika'i; Aohe mo-ewa'a [373] o ka po, e moe la nei. E Lohiau ipo, e Wahine-oma'o, Hoe 'a mai ka wa'a i a'e aku au.
TRANSLATION
We meet at Ewa's leaf-shaped lagoon, friends; Let us sit, if you will, on this lea And bedeck us with wreaths of Kauno'a, Of akuli-kuli and wili-wili. My soul went astray in this solitude; It lost the track for once, in spite of luck, As I came down the road to Kau-pe'a. No nightmare dream was that which tricked my soul. This way, dear friends; turn the canoe this way; Paddle hither and let me embark.
Hiiaka again in command, the tiger in Lohiau's nature slunk away into its kennel, allowing his energies to spend themselves in useful work. Under his vigorous paddle the little craft once more moved like a thing of life and long before night found itself off the harbor of Kou, the name then applied to what we now call Honolulu.
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