Part 9

Applying this criterion to the mele above given, it may be judged to be by no means a product wholly of the archaic period. While certain parts, say from the first to the tenth verses, inclusive, bear the mark of antiquity, the other parts do not ring clear. It seems as if some poet of comparatively modern times had revamped an old mele to suit his own ends. Of this last part two verses were so glaringly an interpolation that they were expunged from the text.

The effort to translate into pure Anglo-Saxon this vehement outpour of high-colored phrases has made heavy demands on the vocabulary and has strained the idioms of our speech well-nigh to the point of protest.

In lines 1, 2, 4, 8, 14, and 23 the word _Lani_ means a prince or princess, a high chief or king, a heavenly one. In lines 12, 13, 18, and 20 the same word _lani_ means the heavens, a concept in the Hawaiian mind that had some far-away approximation to the Olympus of classic Greece.

_Mele_

Ooe no paha ia, e ka lau o ke aloha, Oia no paha ia ke kau mai nei ka hali’a. Ke hali’a-li’a mai nei ka maka, Manao hiki mai no paha au anei. 5 Hiki mai no la ia, na wai e uwe aku? Ua pau kau la, kau ike iaia; Ka manawa oi’ e ai ka manao iloko. Ua luu iho nei au i ke kai nui; Nui ka ukiuki, paio o ka naau. 10 Aohe kanaka eha ole i ke aloha. A wahine e oe, kanaka e au; He mau alualu ka ha’i e lawe. Ike aku i ke kula i’a o Ka-wai-nui. Nui ka opala ai o Moku-lana. 15 Lana ka limu pae hewa o Makau-wahine. O ka wahine no oe, o ke kane no ia. Hiki mai no la ia, na wai e uwe aku? Hoi mai no la ia, a ia wai e uwe aku?

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[Translation.]

_Song_

Methinks it is you, leaf plucked from Love’s tree, You mayhap, that stirs my affection. There’s a tremulous glance of the eye, The thought she might chance yet to come: 5 But who then would greet her with song? Your day has flown, your vision of her— A time this for gnawing the heart. I’ve plunged just now in deep waters: Oh the strife and vexation of soul! 10 No mortal goes scathless of love. A wife thou estranged, I a husband estranged, Mere husks to be cast to the swine.[203] Look, the swarming of fish at the weir! Their feeding grounds on the reef 15 Are waving with mosses abundant. Thou art the woman, that one your man— At her coming who’ll greet her with song? Her returning, who shall console?

[Footnote 203: In the original, _He mau alualu ka ha’i e lawe_, literally “Some skins for another to take.”]

This song almost explains itself. It is the soliloquy of a lover estranged from his mistress. Imagination is alive in eye and ear to everything that may bring tidings of her, even of her unhoped-for return. Sometimes he speaks as if addressing the woman who has gone from him, or he addresses himself, or he personifies some one who speaks to him, as in the sixth line: “Your day has flown, ...”

The memory of past vexation and anguish extorts the philosophic remark, “No mortal goes scathless of love.” He gives over the past, seeks consolation in a new attachment—he dives, _lu’u_, into the great ocean, “deep waters,” of love, at least in search of love. The old self (selves), the old love, he declares to be only _alualu_, empty husks.

He—it is evidently a man—sets forth the wealth of comfort, opulence, that surrounds him in his new-found peace. The scene, being laid in the land Kailua, Oahu—the place to which the enchanted tree _Maka-léi_[204] was carried long ago, from which time its waters abounded in fish—fish are naturally the symbol of the opulence that now bless his life. But, in spite of the new-found peace and prosperity that attend him, there is a lonely corner in his heart; the old question echoes in its vacuum, “Who’ll greet her with song? who shall console?”

[Footnote 204: _Maka-léi_. (See note _b_, p. 17.)]

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_Mele_

O Ewa, aina kai ula i ka lepo, I ula i ka makani anu Moa’e, Ka manu ula i ka lau ka ai, I palahe’a ula i ke kai o Kuhi-á.

5 Mai kuhi mai oukou e, owau ke kalohe; Aohe na’u, na lakou no a pau. Aohe hewa kekahi keiki a ke kohe. Ei’ a’e; oia no paha ia. I lono oukou ia wai, e, ua moe?

10 Oia kini poai o lakou la paha? Ike aku ia ka mau’u hina-hina— He hina ko’u, he aka mai ko ia la. I aka mai oe i kou la manawa le’a; A manawa ino, nui mai ka nuku,

15 Hoomokapu, hoopale mai ka maka, Hoolahui wale mai i a’u nei. E, oia paha; ae, oia no paha ia.

[Translation.]

_Song_

Ewa’s lagoon is red with dirt— Dust blown by the cool Moa’e, A plumage red on the taro leaf, An ocherous tint in the bay.

5 Say not in your heart that I am the culprit. Not I, but they, are at fault. No child of the womb is to blame. There goes, likely he is the one. Who was it blabbed of the bed defiled?

10 It must have been one of that band. But look at the rank grass beat down— For my part, I tripped, the other one smiled. You smiled in your hour of pleasure; But now, when crossed, how you scold!

15 Avoiding the house, averting the eyes— You make of me a mere stranger. Yes it’s probably so, he’s the one.

A poem this full of local color. The plot of the story, as it may be interpreted, runs somewhat as follows: While the man of the house, presumably, is away, it would seem—fishing, perhaps, in the waters of Ewa’s “shamrock lagoon”—the mistress sports with a lover. The culprit impudently defends himself with chaff and dust-throwing. The hoodlums, one of whom is himself the sinner, have been blabbing, says he. [Page 85] His accuser points to the beaten down _hina-hina_ grass as evidence against him. At this the brazen-faced culprit parries the stroke with a humorous euphemistic description, in which he plays on the word _hina_, to fall. Such verbal tilting in ancient Hawaii was practically a defense against a charge of moral obliquity as decisive and legitimate as was an appeal to arms in the times of chivalry. He euphemistically speaks of the beaten herbage as the result of his having tripped and fallen, at which, says he, the woman smiled, that is she fell in with his proposals. He gives himself away; but that doesn’t matter.

It requires some study to make out who is the speaker in the tit-for-tat of the dialogue.

_Mele_

(Ai-ha’a)

He lua i ka Hikina, Ua ena e Pele; Ke haoloolo e la ke ao, Ke lele la i-luna, i-lalo; 5 Kawewe ka o-ó i-lalo i akea; A ninau o Wakea, Owai nei akua e eli nei? Owan no, o Pele, Nona i eli aku ka lua i Niihau a a.

10 He lua i Niihau, ua ena e Pele. He haoloolo e la ke ao, Ke lele la i-luna, i-lalo; Kawewe ka o-ó i-lalo i akea; A ninau o Wakea, 15 Owai nei akua e eli nei? Owau no, o Pele, Nana i eli aku ka lua i Kauai a a.

He lua i Kauai ua ena e Pele. Ke haoloolo e la ke ao, 20 Ke lele la i-luna, i-lalo; Kawewe ka o-ó i-lalo i akea; Ninau o Wakea, Owai nei akua e eli nei? Owau no, o Pele, 25 Nana i eli ka lua i Oahu a a.

He lua i Oahu, ua ena e Pele. Ke haoloolo e la ke ao, Ke lele la i-luna, i-lalo; Kawewe ka o-ó i-lalo i akea; 30 A ninau o Wakea, Owai nei akua e eli nei? Owau no, o Pele, Nana i eli ka lua i Molokai a a.

[Page 86] He lua i Molokai, ua ena e Pele. 35 Ke haoloolo e la ke ao, Ke lele la i-luna, i-lalo; Kawewe ka o-ó i-lalo, i akea. Ninau o Wakea, Owai nei akua e eli nei? 40 Owau no, o Pele, Nana i eli aku ka lua i Lanai a a.

He lua i Lanai, ua ena e Pele. Ke haoloolo e la ke ao, Ke lele la i-luna, i-lalo; 45 Kawewe ka o-ó i-lalo i akea. Ninau o Wakea, Owai nei akua e eli nei? Owau no, o Pele, Nana i eli aku ka lua i Maui a a.

50 He lua i Maui, ua ena e Pele. Ke haoloolo e la ke ao, Ke lele la i-luna, i-lalo; Kawewe ka o-ó i-lalo, i akea. Ninau o Wakea, 55 Owai, nei akua e eli nei? Owau no, o Pele, Nana i eli aku ka lua i Hu’ehu’e a a.

He lua i Hu’ehu’e, ua ena e Pele. Ke haoloolo e la ke ao, 60 Ke lele la i-luna, i-lalo; Kawewe ka o-ó i-lalo, i akea. Eli-eli, kau mai!

[Translation.]

_Song_

(In turgid style)

A pit lies (far) to the East, Pit het by the Fire-queen Pele. Heaven’s dawn is lifted askew, One edge tilts up, one down, in the sky; 5 The thud of the pick is heard in the ground. The question is asked by Wakea, What god’s this a-digging? It is I, it is Pele, Who dug Mihau deep down till it burned, 10 Dug fire-pit red-heated by Pele.

Night’s curtains are drawn to one side, One lifts, one hangs in the tide. Crunch of spade resounds in the earth. Wakea ’gain urges the query, 15 What god plies the spade in the ground? Quoth Pele, ’tis I: [Page 87] I mined to the fire neath Kauai, On Kauai I dug deep a pit, A fire-well flame-fed by Pele.

20 The heavens are lifted aslant, One border moves up and one down; There’s a stroke of o-ó ’neath the ground. Wakea, in earnest, would know, What demon’s a-grubbing below? 25 I am the worker, says Pele: Oahu I pierced to the quick, A crater white-heated by Pele.

Now morn lights one edge of the sky; The light streams up, the shadows fall down; 30 There’s a clatter of tools deep down. Wakea, in passion, demands, What god this who digs ’neath the ground? It is dame Pele who answers; Hers the toil to dig down to fire, 35 To dig Molokai and reach fire.

Now morning peeps from the sky With one eye open, one shut. Hark, ring of the drill ’neath the plain! Wakea asks you to explain, 40 What imp is a-drilling below? It is I, mutters Pele: I drilled till flame shot forth on Lanai, A pit candescent by Pele.

The morning looks forth aslant; 45 Heaven’s curtains roll up and roll down; There’s a ring of o-ó ’neath the sod. Who, asks Wakea, the god, Who is this devil a-digging? ’Tis I, ’tis Pele, I who 50 Dug on Maui the pit to the fire: Ah, the crater of Maui, Red-glowing with Pele’s own fire!

Heaven’s painted one side by the dawn, Her curtains half open, half drawn; 55 A rumbling is heard far below. Wakea insists he will know The name of the god that tremors the land. ’Tis I, grumbles Pele, I have scooped out the pit Hu’e-hu’e, 60 A pit that reaches to fire, A fire fresh kindled by Pele.

Now day climbs up to the East; Morn folds the curtains of night; The spade of sapper resounds ’neath the plain: 65 The goddess is at it again! [Page 88] This mele comes to us stamped with the hall-mark of antiquity. It is a poem of mythology, but with what story it connects itself, the author knows not.

The translation here given makes no profession of absolute, verbal literalness. One can not transfer a metaphor bodily, head and horns, from one speech to another. The European had to invent a new name for the boomerang or accept the name by which the Australian called it. The Frenchman, struggling with the English language, told a lady he was _gangrened_, he meant he was _mortified_. The cry for literalism is the cry for an impossibility; to put the chicken back into its shell, to return to the bows and arrows of the stone age.

To make the application to the mele in question: the word _ha-olo-olo_, for example, which is translated in several different ways in the poem, is of such generic and comprehensive meaning that one word fails to express its meaning. It is, by the way, not a word to be found in any dictionary. The author had to grope his way to its meaning by following the trail of some Hawaiian pathfinder who, after beating about the bush, finally had to acknowledge that the path had become so much overgrown since he last went that way that he could not find it.

The Arabs have a hundred or more words meaning sword—different kinds of swords. To them our word sword is very unspecific. Talk to an Arab of a sword—you may exhaust the list of special forms that our poor vocabulary compasses, straight sword, broadsword, saber, scimitar, yataghan, rapier, and what not, and yet not hit the mark of his definition.

_Mele_

Haku’i ka uahi o ka lua, pa i ka lani; Ha’aha’a Hawaii, moku o Keawe i hanau ia. Kiekie ke one o Maláma ia Lohiau, I a’e ’a mai e ke alii o Kahiki, 5 Nana i hele kai uli, kai ele, Kai popolo-hu’a a Kane, Ka wa i po’i ai ke Kai-a-ka-hina-lii, Kai nu’u, kai lewa.

Hoopua o Kane i ka la’i; 10 Pa uli-hiwa mai la ka uka o ke ahi a Laka, Oia wahine kihene lehua o Hopoe, Pu’e aku-o na hala, Ka hala o Panaewa, O Panaewa nui, moku lehua; 15 Ohia kupu ha-o’e-o’e; Lehua ula, i wili ia e ke ahi. A po, e!

Po Puna, po Hilo! Po i ka uahi o ku’u aina. 20 Ola ia kini! Ke a mai la ke ahi! [Page 89]

[Translation.]

_Song_

A burst of smoke from the pit lifts to the skies; Hawaii’s beneath, birth-land of Keawe; Malama’s beach looms before Lohian, Where landed the chief from Kahiki, 5 From a voyage on the blue sea, the dark sea, The foam-mottled sea of Kane, What time curled waves of the king-whelming flood. The sea up-swells, invading the land—

Lo Kane, outstretched at his ease! 10 Smoke and flame o’ershadow the uplands, Conflagration by Laka, the woman Hopoe wreathed with flowers of lehua, Stringing the pandanus fruit. Screw-palms that clash in Pan’-ewa— 15 Pan’-ewa, whose groves of lehua Are nourished by lava shag, Lehua that bourgeons with flame.

Night, it is night O’er Puna and Hilo! 20 Night from the smoke of my land! For the people salvation! But the land is on fire!

The Hawaiian who furnished the meles which, in their translated forms, are designated as canto I, canto II, and so on, spoke of them as _pále_, and, following his nomenclature, the term has been retained, though more intimate acquaintance with the meles and with the term has shown that the nearest English synonym to correspond with pale would be the word division. Still, perhaps with a mistaken tenderness for the word, the author has retained the caption Canto, as a sort of nodding recognition of the old Hawaiian’s term—division of a poem. No idea is entertained that the five _pále_ above given were composed by the same bard, or that they represent productions from the same individual standpoint. They do, however, breathe a spirit much in common; so that when the old Hawaiian insisted that they are so far related to one another as to form a natural series for recitation in the hula, being species of the same genus, as it were, he was not far from the truth. The man’s idea seemed to be that they were so closely related that, like beads of harmonious colors and shapes, they might be strung on the same thread without producing a dissonance.

Of these five poems, or _pále_ (páh-lay), numbers I, II, and IV were uttered in a natural tone of voice, termed _kawele_, otherwise termed _ko’i-honua_. The purpose of this style of recitation was to adapt the tone to the necessities of the [Page 90] aged when their ears no longer heard distinctly. It would require an audiphone to illustrate perfectly the difference between this method of pronunciation and the _ai-ha’a_, which was employed in the recitation of cantos III and V. The _ai-ha’a_ was given in a strained and guttural tone.

The poetical reciter and cantillator, whether in the halau or in the king’s court, was wont to heighten the oratorical effect of his recitation by certain crude devices, the most marked of which was that of choking the voice down, as it were, into the throat, and there letting it strain and growl like a hungry lion. This was the ai-ha’a, whose organic function was the expression of the underground passions of the soul.

[Illustration: BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY BULLETIN 33 PLATE VIII MAILE PAKAHA NIHI-AU-MOE MARIONETTES]

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XI.—THE HULA KI’I

I was not a little surprised when I learned that the ancient hula repertory of the Hawaiians included a performance with marionettes, _ki’i_, dressed up to represent human beings. But before accepting the hula _ki’i_ as a product indigenous to Hawaii, I asked myself: Might not this be a performance in imitation of the Punch-and-Judy show familiar to Europe and America?

After careful study of the question no evidence was found, other than what might be inferred from general resemblance, for the theory of adoption from a European or American origin. On the contrary, the words used as an accompaniment to the play agree with report and tradition, and bear convincing evidence in form, and matter to a Hawaiian antiquity. That is not to say, however, that in the use of marionettes the Hawaiians did not hark back to their ancestral homes in the southern sea or to a remoter past in Asia.

The six marionettes, _ki’i_ (pls. VIII and IX), in the writer’s possession were obtained from a distinguished kumu-hula, who received them by inheritance, as it were, from his brother. “He gave them to me,” said he, “with these words,’ Take care of these things, and when the time comes, after my death, that the king wants you to perform before him, be ready to fulfill his desire.’”

It was in the reign of Kamehameha III that they came into the hands of the elder brother, who was then and continued to be the royal hula-master until his death. These ki’i have therefore figured in performances that have been graced by the presence of King Kauikeaouli (Kamehameha III) and his queen, Kalama, and by his successors since then down to the times of Kalakaua. At the so-called “jubilee,” the anniversary of Kalakaua’s fiftieth birthday, these marionettes were very much in evidence.

The make-up and style of these ki’i are so similar that a description of one will serve for all six. This marionette represents the figure of a man, and was named _Maka-kú_ (pl. IX). The head is carved out of some soft wood—either kukui or wiliwili—which is covered, as to the hairy scalp, with a dark woven fabric much like broadcloth. It is encircled at the level of the forehead with a broad band of gilt braid, as if to ape the style of a soldier. The median line from the forehead over the vertex to the back-head is crested with the _mahiole_ ridge. This, taken in connection with the [Page 92] encircling gilt band, gives to the head a warlike appearance, somewhat as if it were armed with the classical helmet, the Hawaiian name for which is _mahi-ole_. The crest of the ridge and its points of junction with the forehead and back-head are decorated with fillets of wool dyed of a reddish color, in apparent imitation of the _mamo_ or _o-ó_, the birds whose feathers were used in decorating helmets, cloaks, and other regalia. The features are carved with some attempt at fidelity. The eyes are set with mother-of-pearl.

The figure is of about one-third life size, and was originally draped, the author was told, in a loose robe, _holokú_ of tapa cloth of the sort known as _mahuna_, which is quite thin. This piece of tapa is perforated at short intervals with small holes, _kiko’i_. It is also stained with the juice from the bark of the root of the kukui tree, which imparts a color like that of copper, and makes the Hawaiians class it as _pa’ikukui_. A portion of its former, its original, apparel has been secured.

The image is now robed in a holokú of yellow cotton, beneath which is an underskirt of striped silk in green and white. The arms are loosely jointed to the body.

The performer in the hula, who stood behind a screen, by insinuating his hands under the clothing of the marionette, could impart to it such movements as were called for by the action of the play, while at the same time he repeated the words of his part, words supposed to be uttered by the marionette.

The hula ki’i was, perhaps, the nearest approximation made by the Hawaiians to a genuine dramatic performance. Its usual instrument of musical accompaniment was the ipu, previously described. This drumlike object was handled by that division of the performers called the hoopa’a, who sat in full view of the audience manipulating the ipu in a quiet, sentimental manner, similar to that employed in the hula kuolo.

As a sample of the stories illustrated in a performance of the hula ki’i the following may be adduced, the dramatis personae of which are four:

1. _Maka-kú_: a famous warrior, a rude, strong-handed braggart, as boastful as Ajax.

2. _Puapua-kea_, a small man, but brave and active.

3. _Maile-lau-lii_ (Small-leafed-maile), a young woman, who becomes the wife of Maka-ku.

4. _Maile-Pakaha_, the younger sister of Maile-lau-lii, who becomes the wife of Puapua-kea.

Maka-kú, a rude and boastful son of Mars, at heart a bully, if not a coward, is represented as ever aching for a fight, in which his domineering spirit and rough-and-tumble ways for a time gave him the advantage over abler, but more modest, adversaries.

[Illustration: BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY, BULLETIN 38 PLATE IX MARIONETTE, MAKA-KÚ]

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Puapuakea, a man of genuine courage, hearing of the boastful achievements of Maka-kú, seeks him out and challenges him.

At the first contest they fought with javelins, _ihe_, each one taking his turn according to lot in casting his javelins to the full tale of the prescribed number; after which the other contestant did the same. Neither was victorious.

Next they fought with slings, each one having the right to sling forty stones at the other. In this conflict also neither one of them got the better of the other. The next trial was with stone-throwing. The result was still the same.