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XIV
Ahuula
A Legend of Kanikaniaula and the First Feather Cloak

Mrs. E. M. Nakuina

Eleio was a kukini (trained runner) in the service of Kakaalaneo, King of Maui, several runners being always kept by each king or alii of consequence. These kukinis, when sent on any errand, always took a direct line for their destination, climbing hills with the agility of goats, jumping over rocks and streams, and leaping from precipices. They were so fleet of foot that the common illustration of the fact among the natives was the saying that when a kukini was sent on an errand that would ordinarily take a day and a night, fish wrapped in ki leaves (known as lawalu), if put on the fire on his starting, would not be cooked sufficiently to be turned before he would be back. Being so serviceable to the aliis, kukinis always enjoyed a high degree of consideration, freedom, and immunity from the strict etiquette and unwritten laws of a Hawaiian court. There was hardly anything so valuable in their master’s possession that they could not have it if they wished.

Eleio was sent to Hana to fetch awa for the King, and was expected to be back in time for the King’s supper. Kakaalaneo was then living at Lahaina. Now, Eleio was not only a kukini, but he was also a kahuna, and had been initiated in the ceremonies and observances by which he was enabled to see spirits or wraiths, and was skilled in medicines, charms, etc., and could return a wandering spirit to its body unless decomposition had set in.

Soon after leaving Olowalu, and as he commenced the ascent of Aalaloloa, he saw a beautiful young woman ahead of him. He naturally hastened his steps, intending to overtake such a charming fellow-traveller; but, do what he would, she kept always just so far ahead of him. Being the fleetest and most renowned kukini of his time, it roused his professional pride to be outrun by a woman, even if only for a short distance; so he was determined to catch her, and he gave himself entirely to that effort. The young woman led him a weary chase over rocks, hills, mountains, deep ravines, precipices, and dark streams, till they came to the Lae (cape) of Hanamanuloa at Kahikinui, beyond Kaupo, when he caught her just at the entrance to a puoa. A puoa was a kind of tower, generally of bamboo, with a platform half-way up, on which the dead bodies of persons of distinction belonging to certain families or classes were exposed to the elements.

When Eleio caught the young woman she turned to him and cried: “Let me live! I am not human, but a spirit, and inside this inclosure is my dwelling.”

He answered: “I have been aware for some time of your being a spirit. No human being could have so outrun me.”

She then said: “Let us be friends. In yonder house live my parents and relatives. Go to them and ask for a hog, kapas, some fine mats, and a feather cloak. Describe me to them and tell them that I give all those things to you. The feather cloak is unfinished. It is now only a fathom and a half square, and was intended to be two fathoms. There are enough feathers and netting in the house to finish it. Tell them to finish it for you.” The spirit then disappeared.

Eleio entered the puoa, climbed on to the platform, and saw the dead body of the girl. She was in every way as beautiful as the spirit had appeared to him, and apparently decomposition had not yet set in. He left the puoa and hurried to the house pointed out by the spirit as that of her friends, and saw a woman wailing, whom, from the resemblance, he at once knew to be the mother of the girl; so he saluted her with an aloha. He then said: “I am a stranger here, but I had a travelling companion who guided me to yonder puoa and then disappeared.” At these strange words the woman stopped wailing and called to her husband, to whom she repeated what the stranger had said. The latter then asked: “Does this house belong to you?”

Husband and wife, wondering, answered at once: “It does.”

“Then,” said Eleio, “my message is to you. My travelling companion has a hog a fathom in length in your care; also a pile of fine kapas of Paiula and others of fine quality; also a pile of mats and an unfinished feather cloak, now a fathom and a half in length, which you are to finish, the materials being in the house. All these things she has given to me, and sent me to you for them.” Then he began to describe the young woman. Both parents recognized the truthfulness of the description, and willingly agreed to give up the things which their beloved daughter must have herself given away. But when they spoke of killing the hog and making an ahaaina (feast) for him, whom they had immediately resolved to adopt as a son, he said: “Wait a little and let me ask: Are all these people I see around this place your friends?”

They both answered: “They are our relatives—uncles, aunts, and cousins to the spirit, who seems to have adopted you either as husband or brother.”

“Will they do your bidding in everything?” he asked.

They answered that they could be relied upon. He directed them to build a large lanai, or arbor, to be entirely covered with ferns, ginger, maile, and ieie—the sweet and odorous foliage greens of the islands. An altar was to be erected at one end of the lanai and appropriately decorated. The order was willingly carried out, men, women, and children working with a will, so that the whole structure was finished in a couple of hours.

Eleio now directed the hog to be cooked. He also ordered cooked red and white fish, red, white, and black cocks, and bananas of the lele and maoli varieties, to be placed on the altar. He ordered all women and children to enter their houses and to assist him with their prayers; all pigs, chickens, and dogs to be tied in dark huts to keep them quiet, and that the most profound silence should be kept. The men at work were asked to remember their gods, and to invoke their assistance for Eleio. He then started for Hana, pulled up a couple of bushes of awa of Kaeleku, famous for its medicinal properties, and was back again before the hog was cooked. The awa was prepared, and when the preparations for the feast were complete and set out, he offered everything to his gods and begged assistance in what he was about to perform.

It seems the spirit of the girl had been lingering near him all the time, seeming to be attached to him, but of course invisible to every one. When Eleio had finished his invocation he turned and caught the spirit, and, holding his breath and invoking the gods, he hurried to the puoa, followed by the parents, who now began to understand that he was going to try the kapuku (or restoration to life of the dead) on their daughter. Arriving at the puoa, he placed the spirit against the insteps of the girl and pressed it firmly in, meanwhile continuing his invocation. The spirit entered its former tenement kindly enough until it came to the knees, when it refused to go any further, as from there it could perceive that the stomach was beginning to decompose, and it did not want to be exposed to the pollution of decaying matter. But Eleio, by the strength of his prayers, was enabled to push the spirit up past the knees till it came to the thigh bones, when the refractory spirit again refused to proceed. He had to put additional fervor into his prayers to overcome the spirit’s resistance, and it proceeded up to the throat, when there was some further check; by this time the father, mother, and male relatives were all grouped around anxiously watching the operation, and they all added the strength of their petitions to those of Eleio, which enabled him to push the spirit past the neck, when the girl gave a sort of crow. There was now every hope of success, and all the company renewed their prayers with redoubled vigor. The spirit made a last feeble resistance at the elbows and wrists, which was triumphantly overborne by the strength of the united prayers. Then it quietly submitted, took complete possession of the body, and the girl came to life. She was submitted to the usual ceremonies of purification by the local priest, after which she was led to the prepared lanai, when kahuna, maid, parents, and relatives had a joyous reunion. Then they feasted on the food prepared for the gods, who were only supposed to absorb the spiritual essence of things, leaving the grosser material parts to their devotees, who, for the time being, are considered their guests.

After the feast the feather cloak, kapas, and fine mats were brought and displayed to Eleio; and the father said to him: “Take the woman thou hast restored and have her for wife, and remain here with us; you will be our son and will share equally in the love we have for her.”

But our hero, with great self-denial and fidelity, said: “No, I accept her as a charge, but for wife, she is worthy to be one for a higher than I. If you will trust her to me, I will take her to my master, for by her beauty and charms she is worthy to be the queen of our lovely island.”

The father answered: “She is yours to do with as you will. It is as if you had created her, for without you, where would she be now? We only ask this, that you always remember that you have parents and relatives here, and a home whenever you choose.”

Eleio then asked that the feather cloak be finished for him before he returned to his master. All who could work at feathers set about it at once, including the fair girl restored to life; and he now learned that she was called Kanikaniaula.

When it was completed he set out on his return to Lahaina accompanied by the girl, and taking the feather cloak and the remaining awa he had not used in his incantations. They travelled slowly according to the strength of Kanikaniaula, who now in the body could not equal the speed she had displayed as a spirit.

Arriving at Launiupoko, Eleio turned to her and said: “You wait and hide here in the bushes while I go on alone. If by sundown I do not return, I shall be dead. You know the road by which we came; then return to your people. But if all goes well with me I shall be back in a little while.”

He then went on alone, and when he reached Makila, on the confines of Lahaina, he saw a number of people heating an imu, or underground oven. On perceiving him they started to bind and roast him alive, such being the orders of the King, but he ordered them away with the request, “Let me die at the feet of my master.” And thus he passed successfully the imu heated for him.

When he finally stood before Kakaalaneo, the latter said to him: “How is this? Why are you not cooked alive, as I ordered? How came you to pass my lunas?”

The kukini answered: “It was the wish of the slave to die at the feet of his master, if die he must; but if so, it would be an irreparable loss to you, my master, for I have that with me that will cause your name to be renowned and handed down to posterity.”

“And what is that?” questioned the King.

Eleio then unrolled his bundle and displayed to the astonished gaze of the King and courtiers the glories of a feather cloak, before then unheard of on the islands. Needless to say, he was immediately pardoned and restored to royal favor, and the awa he had brought from Hana was reserved for the King’s special use in his offerings to the gods that evening.

When the King heard the whole story of Eleio’s absence, and that the fair original owner was but a short way off, he ordered her to be immediately brought before him that he might express his gratitude for the wonderful garment. When she arrived, he was so struck with her beauty and modest deportment that he ask her to become his Queen. Thus, some of the highest chiefs of the land traced their descent from Kakaalaneo and Kanikaniaula. The original feather cloak, known as the “Ahu o Kakaalaneo,” is said to be in the possession of the Pauahi Bishop Museum. At one time it was used on state occasions as pa-u, or skirt, by Princess Nahienaena, own sister of the second and third Kamehame-has.

The ahuulas of the ancient Hawaiians were of fine netting, entirely covered, with feathers woven in. These were either of one color and kind or two or three different colors outlining patterns. The feathers were knotted by twos or threes with twisted strands of the olona, the process being called uo. They were then woven into the foundation netting previously made the exact shape and size wanted. The whole process of feather cloak making was laborious and intricate, and the making of a cloak took a great many years. And as to durability, let the cloak of Kalaalaneo, now several centuries old, attest.

XV
Kaala and Kaaialii
A Legend of Lanai

W. M. Gibson

Bordering upon the land of Kealia, on the southwest coast of Lanai, where was pahonua or place of refuge, are the remains of Kaunolu, an ancient heiau, or temple. Its ruins lie within the mouth of a deep ravine, whose extending banks run out into the sea and form a bold, bluff-bound bay. On the top of the western bank there is a stone-paved platform, called the kuaha. Outside of this, and separated by a narrow alley-way, there runs a broad high wall, which quite encircles the kuaha. Other walls and structures lead down the bank, and the slope is terraced and paved down to the tide-worn stones of the shore.

At the beach there is a break; a great block of the bluff has been rent away by some convulsion of nature, and stands out like a lone tower, divided from the main by a gulf of the sea. Its high walls beetle from their tops, upon which neither man nor goat can climb. But you can behold on the flat summit of this islet bluff, portions of ancient work, of altars and walls, and no doubt part of the mainland temple, to which this fragment once was joined. But man can visit this lone tower’s top no more, and his feet can never climb its overhanging walls.

Inland from the temple there are many remains of the huts of the people of the past. The stone foundations, the inclosures for swine, the round earth ovens, and other traces of a throng of people cover many acres of beach and hillside. This was a town famed as an abode of gods and a refuge for those who fled for their lives; but it drew its people mainly through the fame of its fishing-ground, which swarmed with the varied life of the Hawaiian seas.

To this famed fishing-ground came the great hero of Hawaii to tax the deep, when he had subdued this and the other isles. He came with his fleets of war canoes; with his faithful koas, or fighting men, with his chiefs, and priests, and women, and their trains. He had a house here. Upon the craggy bluff that forms the eastern bank of the bay there is a lonely pa, or wall, and stones of an ancient fort, overlooking the temple, town, and bay.

Kamehameha came to Kealia for sport rather than for worship. Who so loved to throw the maika ball, or hurl the spear, or thrust aside the many javelins flung at his naked chest, as the chief of Kohala? He rode gladly on the crest of the surf waves. He delighted to drive his canoe alone out into the storm. He fought with the monsters of the deep, as well as with men. He captured the great shark that abounds in the bay, and he would clutch in the fearful grip of his hands the deadly eel or snake of these seas, the terror of fishes and men.

When this warrior king came to Kaunolu, the islanders thronged to the shore to pay homage to the great chief, and to lay at the feet of their sovereign, as was their wont, the products of the isle: the taro, the yam, the hala, the cocoanut, ohelo, banana, and sweet potato. They piled up a mound of food before the door of the King’s pakui, along with a clamorous multitude of fat poi-fed dogs, and of fathom-long swine.

Besides this tribute of the men, the workers of the land, the women filled the air with the sweet odors of their floral offerings. The maidens were twined from head to waist with leis or wreaths of the na-u, which is Lanai’s own lovely jessamine—a rare gardenia, whose sweet aroma loads the breeze, and leads you to the bush when seeking it afar off. These garlands were fastened to the plaited pili thatch of the King’s pakui; they were placed on the necks of the young warriors, who stood around the chief; and around his royal brows they twined an odorous crown of maile.

The brightest of the girlish throng who stood before the dread Lord of the Isles was Kaala, or Sweet Scented, whose fifteen suns had just burnished her sweet brown face with a soft golden gloss; and her large, round, tender eyes knew yet no wilting fires. Her neck and arms, and all of her young body not covered by the leafy pa-u, was tinted with a soft sheen like unto a rising moon. Her skin glowed with the glory of youth, and mingled its delicate odor of health with the blooms of the groves, so that the perfume of her presence received fittingly the name of Fragrance.

In those rude days the island race was sound and clean. The supple round limbs were made bright and strong by the constant bath and the temperate breeze. They were not cumbered with clothing; they wore no long, sweating gowns, but their smooth, shining skins reflected back their sun, which gave them such a rich and dusky charm.

Perhaps such a race cannot long wear all our gear and live. They are best clothed with sea foam, or with the garlands of their groves. How sweetly blend the brown and green; and when young, soft, amber-tinted cheeks, glowing with the crimson tide beneath, are wreathed with the odorous evergreens of the isles, you see the poesy of our kind, and the sweet, wild grace that dwelt in the Eden Paradise.

The sweet Kaala stood mindless of harm, as the playful breeze rustled the long blades of the la-i (dracæna) leaves, hanging like a bundle of green swords from her waist; and as they twirled and fluttered in the air, revealed the soft, rounded form, whose charm filled the eye and heart of one who stood among the braves of the great chief—the heart of the stout young warrior Kaaialii.

This youth had fought in the battle of Maunalei, Lanai’s last bloody fight. With his long-reaching spear, wielded with sinewy arms, he urged the flying foe to the top of a fearful cliff, and mocking the cries of a huddled crowd of panic-scared men, drove them with thrusts and shouts till they leaped like frightened sheep into the jaws of the deep, dark chasm, and their torn corpses strewed the jagged stones below.

Kaaialii, like many a butcher of his kind, was comely to see. With the lion’s heart, he had the lion’s tawny hue. A swart grace beamed beneath his curling brows. He had the small, firm hand to throttle or caress, and eyes full of fire for hate or love; and love’s flame now lit the face of the hero of the bloody leap, and to his great chief he said, “O King of all the isles, let this sweet flower be mine, rather than the valley thou gavest me for my domain.”

Said Kamehameha: “You shall plant the Lanai jessamine in the valley I gave you in Kohala. But there is another who claims our daughter, who is the stout bone-breaker, the scarred Mailou. My spearman of Maunalei can have no fear; and you shall wrestle with him; and let the one whose arms can clasp the girl after the fight carry her to his house, where one kapa shall cover the two.”

The poor maid, the careless gift of savage power, held up her clasped hands with a frightened gesture at the dread name of the breaker of bones; for she had heard how he had sucked the breath of many a dainty bloom like her, then crunched the wilted blossom with sinews of hate, and flung it to the sharks.

And the Lanai maiden loved the young chief of Hawaii. He had indeed pierced her people, but only the tender darts of his eyes had wounded her. Turning to him, she looked her savage, quick, young love, and said, “O Kaaialii, may thy grip be as sure as thy thrust. Save me from the bloody virgin-eater, and I will catch the squid and beat the kapa for thee all my days.”

The time of contest approached. The King sat under the shade of a leafy kou, the royal tree of the olden time, which has faded away with the chiefs it once did shelter. On the smooth shell floor, covered with the hala mat, stood the bare-limbed braves, stripped to the malo, who with hot eyes of hate shot out their rage of lust and blood, and stretched out their strangling arms. They stood, beating with heavy fists their broad, glossy chests of bronze, and grinning face to face, they glowered their savage wish to kill. Then, with right foot advanced, and right arm uplifted, they pause to shout their gage of battle, and tell to each how they would maim and tear, and kill, and give each other’s flesh for food to some beastly maw.

And now, each drawing near to each, with arms uplifted, and outspread palms with sinewy play, like nervy claws trying to clutch or grip, they seek a chance for a deadly clinch. And swift the scarred child-strangler has sprung with his right to the young spear-man’s throat, who as quickly hooks the lunging arm within the crook of his, and with quick, sledge-like blow breaks the shoulder arm-bone.

With fury the baffled bone-breaker grips with the uncrippled hand; but now two stout young arms, tense with rage, soon twist and break the one unaided limb. Then with limp arms the beaten brute turns to flee; but swift hate is upon him, and clutches him by the throat; and pressing him down, the hero of Kaala holds his knee to the hapless wretch’s back, and with knee bored into the backward bended spine, he strains and jerks till the jointed bones snap and break, and the dread throttler of girls and babes lies prone on the mat, a broken and bloody corpse.

“Good!” cried the King. “Our son has the strength of Kanekoa. Now let our daughter soothe the limbs of her lover. Let her stroke his skin, press his joints, and knead his back with the loving grip and touch of the lomilomi. We will have a great bake, with the hula and song; and when the feast is over, then shall they be one.”

A line of women squat down. They crone their wild refrain, praising the one who wins in strife and love. They seize in their right hand the hula gourd, clattering with pebbles inside. They whirl it aloft, they shake, they swing, they strike their palms, they thump the mat; and now with supple joints they twirl their loins, and with heave and twist, and with swing and song, the savage dance goes on.

Kaala stood up with the maiden throng, the tender, guarded gifts of kings. They twined their wreaths, they swayed, and posed their shining arms; and flapping with their hands their leafy skirts, revealed their rounded limbs. This fires the gaze of men, and the hero of the day with flaming eyes, springs and clasps his love, crying as he bears her away: “Thou shalt dance in my hut in Kohala for me alone, forever!”

At this, a stout yet grizzled man of the isle lifts up his voice and wails: “Kaala, my child, is gone. Who shall soothe my limbs when I return from spearing the ohua? And who shall feed me with taro and breadfruit like the chief of Olowalu, when I have no daughter to give away? I must hide from the chief or I die.” And thus wailed out Opunui, the father of Kaala.

But a fierce hate stirred the heart of Opunui. His friend was driven over the cliff at Maunalei, and he himself had lived only by crawling at the feet of the slayer. He hid his hate, and planned to save his girl and balk the killer of his people. He said in his heart, “I will hide her in the sea, and none but the fish gods and I shall know where the ever-sounding surf surges over Kaala.”

Now, in the morn, when the girl with ruddy brown cheeks, and glowing with the brightening dawn of love, stood in the doorway of the lodge of her lord, and her face was sparkling with the sheen from the sun, her sire in humble guise stood forth and said, “My child, your mother at Mahana is dying. Pray you, my lord, your love, that you may see her once more before his canoe shall bear you to his great land.”

“Alas!” said the tender child, “since when is Kalani ill? I shall carry to her this large sweet fish speared by my lord; and when I have rubbed her aching limbs, she will be well again with the love touch of her child. Yes, my lord will let me go. Will you not, O Kaaialii; will you not let me go to give my mother a last embrace, and I shall be back again before the moon has twice spanned the bay?”

The hero clasped his young love with one stout twining arm, and gazing into her eyes, he with a caressing hand put back from her brow her shining hair, and thus to his heart’s life he spoke: “O my sweet flower, how shall I live without thee, even for this day’s march of the sun? For thou art my very breath, and I shall pant and die like a stranded fish without thee. But no, let me not say so. Kaaialii is a chief who has fought men and sharks; and he must not speak like a girl. He too loves his mother, who looks for him in the valley of Kohala; and shall he deny thy mother, to look her last upon the sweet face and the tender limbs that she fed and reared for him? Go, my Kaala. But thy chief will sit and watch with a hungering heart, till thou come back to his arms again.”

And the pretty jessamine twined her arms around his neck, and laying her cheek upon his breast said, with upturned tender glances, “O my chief, who gavest me life and sweet joy; thy breath is my breath; thy eyes are my sweetest sight; thy breast is my only resting-place; and when I go away, I shall all the way look back to thee, and go slowly with a backward turned heart; but when I return to thee, I shall have wings to bear me to my lord.”

“Yes, my own bird,” said Kaaialii, “thou must fly, but fly swiftly in thy going as well as in thy coming; for both ways thou fliest to me. When thou art gone I shall spear the tender ohua fish, I shall bake the yam and banana, and I will fill the calabash with sweet water, to feed thee, my heart, when thou shalt come; and thou shalt feed me with thy loving eyes.

“Here, Opunui! take thy child. Thou gavest life to her, but now she gives life to me. Bring her back all well, ere the sun has twice risen. If she come not soon, I shall die; but I should slay thee before I die; therefore, O Opunui, hasten thy going and thy coming, and bring back my life and love to me.”

And now the stern hero unclasped the weeping girl. His eye was calm, but his shut lips showed the work within of a strong and tender heart of love. He felt the ache of a larger woe than this short parting. He pressed the little head between his palms; he kissed the sobbing lips again and again; he gave one strong clasp, heart to heart, and then quickly strode away.

As Kaala tripped along the stony up-hill path, she glanced backward on her way, to get glimpses of him she loved, and she beheld her chief standing on the topmost rock of the great bluff overhanging the sea. And still as she went and looked, still there he stood; and when on the top of the ridge and about to descend into the great valley, she turned to look her last, still she saw her loving lord looking up to her.

The silent sire and the weeping child soon trod the round, green vale of Palawai. She heeded not now to pluck, as was her wont, the flowers in her path; but thought how she should stop a while, as she came back, to twine a wreath for her dear lord’s neck. And thus this sad young love tripped along with innocent hope by the moody Opunui’s side.

They passed through the groves of Kalulu and Kumoku, and then the man swerved from the path leading to Mahana and turned his face again seaward. At this the sad and silent child looked up into the face of her grim and sullen sire and said: “O father, we shall not find mother on this path, but we shall lose our way and come to the sea once more.”

“And thy mother is by the sea, by the bay of Kaumalapau. There she gathers limpets on the rocks. She has dried a large squid for thee. She has pounded some taro and filled her calabash with poi, and would feed thee once more. She is not sick; but had I said she was well, thy lord would not have let thee go; but now thou art on the way to sleep with thy mother by the sea.”

The poor weary girl now trudged on with a doubting heart. She glanced sadly at her dread sire’s moody eye. Silent and sore she trod the stony path leading down to the shore, and when she came to the beach with naught in view but the rocks and sea, she said with a bursting heart, “O my father, is the shark to be my mother, and I to never see my dear chief any more?”

“Hear the truth,” cried Opunui. “Thy home for a time is indeed in the sea, and the shark shall be thy mate, but he shall not harm thee. Thou goest down where the sea god lives, and he shall tell thee that the accursed chief of the bloody leap shall not carry away any daughter of Lanai. When Kaaialii has sailed for Kohala then shall the chief of Olowalu come and bring thee to earth again.”

As the fierce sire spoke, he seized the hand of Kaala, and unheeding her sobs and cries, led her along the rugged shore to a point eastward of the bay, where the beating sea makes the rocky shore tremble beneath the feet. Here was a boiling gulf, a fret and foam of the sea, a roar of waters, and a mighty jet of brine and spray from a spouting cave whose mouth lay deep beneath the battling tide.

See yon advancing billow! The south wind sends it surging along. It rears its combing, whitening crest, and with mighty, swift-rushing volume of angry green sea, it strikes the mouth of the cave; it drives and packs the pent-up air within, and now the tightened wind rebounds, and driving back the ramming sea, bursts forth with a roar as the huge spout of sea leaps upward to the sky, and then comes curving down in gentle silver spray.

The fearful child now clasped the knees of her savage sire. “Not there, O father,” she sobbed and wailed. “The sea snake (the puhi) has his home in the cave, and he will bite and tear me, and ere I die, the crawling crabs will creep over me and pick out my weeping eyes. Alas, O father, better give me to the shark, and then my cry and moan will not hurt thine ear.”