The Hawaiian Romance Of Laieikawai. S. N. Haleole

the Westervelt story, on the whole, the action is treated mythically to explain how things came to be as they are—how the gods peopled the islands, how the hula dances and the lore of the clouds were taught in Hawaii. The reason for the localization is apparent. The deep forests of Puna, long dedicated to the gods, with their singing birds, their forest trees whose leaves dance in the wind, their sweet-scented maile vine, with those fine mists which still perpetually shroud the landscape and give the name Haleohu, House-of-mist, to the district, and above all the rainbows so constantly arching over the land, make an appropriate setting for the activities of some family of demigods. Strange and fairylike as much of the incident appears, allegorical as it seems, upon the face of it, the Polynesian mind observes objectively the activities of nature and of man as if they proceeded from the same sort of consciousness.

      [Illustration: IN THE FORESTS OF PUNA (HENSHAW)]

      So, in Haleole's more naturalistic tale the mythical rendering is inwrought into the style of the narrative. Storm weds Perfume. Their children are the Sun-at-high-noon; a second son, possibly Lightning; twin daughters called after two varieties of the forest vine, ieie, perhaps symbols of Rainbow and Twilight; and five sweet-smelling daughters—the four varieties of maile vine and the scented hala blossom. The first-born son is of such divine character that he dwells highest in the heavens. Noonday, like a bird, bears visitors to his gate, and guards of the shade—Moving-cloud and Great-bright-moon—close it to shut out his brightness. The three regions below him are guarded by maternal uncles and by his father, who never comes near the taboo house, which only his mother shares with him. His signs are those of the rainstorm—thunder, lightning, torrents of "red rain," high seas, and long-continued mists—these he inherits from his father. An ancestress rears Rainbow in the forests of Puna. Birds bear her upon their wings and serve her with abundance of food prepared without labor, and of their golden feathers her royal house is built; sweet-scented vines and blossoms surround her; mists shroud her when she goes abroad. Earthquake guards her dwelling, saves Rainbow from Lightning, who seeks to destroy her, and bears a messenger to fetch the Sun-at-high-noon as bridegroom for the beautiful Rainbow. The Sun god comes to earth and bears Rainbow away with him to the heavens, but later he loves her sister Twilight, follows her to earth, and is doomed to sink into Night.

       Footnotes to Section II, 5: The Story: Its Mythical Character

      [Footnote 1: As such Paliuli occurs in other Hawaiian folk tales:

      1. At Paliuli grew the mythical trees Makali'i, male and female, which have the power to draw fish. The female was cut down and taken to Kailua, Oahu, hence the chant:

      "Kupu ka laau ona a Makali'i,

       O Makali'i, laau Kaulana mai ka pomai."

      2. In the Fornander notes from Kepelino and Kamakau, Paliuli is the land given to the first man and is called "hidden land of Kane" and "great land of the gods." 3. In Fornander's story of Kepakailiula, the gods assign Paliuli to be the hero's home. To reach it the party start at second cockcrow from Keaau (as in the Laieikawai) and arrive in the morning. It is "a good land, flat, fertile, filled with many things desired by man." The native apples are as large as breadfruit. They see a pond "lying within the land stocked with all kinds of fish of the sea except the whale and the shark." Here "the sugar cane grew until it lay flat, the hogs until the tusks were long, the chickens until the spurs were long and sharp, and the dogs until their backs were flattened out." They leave Paliuli to travel over Hawaii, and "no man has ever seen it since."

      4. In Fornander's story of Kana, Uli, the grandmother of Kana, goes up to Paliuli to dig up the double canoe Kaumaielieli in which Kana is to sail to recover his mother. The chant in which this canoe is described is used to-day by practicers of sorcery to exorcise an enemy.]

      [Footnote 2: The gods Kane and Kanaloa, who live in the mountains of Oahu, back of Honolulu, prepare a home for the first-born son of Ku and Hina, whom they send Rainbow to fetch from Nuumealani. The messenger, first gaining the consent of the lizard guardian at Kuaihelani, brings back Child-adopted-by-the-gods to the gods on Oahu. Again Hina bears a child, a daughter. For this girl also the gods send two sister messengers, who bring Paliuli to Waka, where she cares for the birds in the forests of Puna. Here a beautiful home is prepared for the girl and a garden planted with two magical food-producing trees, Makalei, brought from Nuumealani to provide fish and prepared food in abundance. These two children, brother and sister, are the most beautiful pair on earth, and the gods arrange their marriage. Kane precedes the boy, dressed in his lightning body, and the tree people come to dance and sing before Paliuli. Some say that the goddess Laka, patroness of the hula dance, accompanied them. For a time all goes well, then the boy is beguiled by Poliahu (Cold-bosom) on the mountain. Paliuli, aware of her lover's infidelity, sends Waka to bring him back, but Cold-bosom prevents his approach, by spreading the mountain with snow. Paliuli wanders away to Oahu, then to Kauai, learning dances on the way which she teaches to the trees in the forest on her return.

      Meanwhile another child is born to Ku and Hina. The lizard guardian draws this lovely girl from the head of Hina, calls her Keaomelemele, Golden-cloud, and sets her to rule the clouds in the Shining-heavens. Among these clouds is Kaonohiokala, the Eyeball-of-the-sun, who knows what is going on at a distance. From the lizard guardian Golden-cloud learns of her sister Paliuli's distress, and she comes to earth to effect a reconciliation. There she learns all the dances that the gods can teach.

      Now, Ku and Hina, having learned the lore of the clouds, choose other mates and each, bears a child, one a boy called Kaumailiula, Twilight-resting-in-the-sky, the other a girl named Kaulanaikipokii.

      The boy is brought to Oahu, riding in a red canoe befitting a chief, to be Goldencloud's husband. His sister follows with her maidens riding in shells, which they pick up and put in their pockets when they come to land. Ku, Hina, and the lizard family also migrate to Oahu to join the gods, Kane and Kanaloa, for the marriage festival. Thus these early gods came to Oahu.]

      [Footnote 3: Although the earthly paradise has the same location in both stories, the name Paliuli in Westervelt's version belongs to the heroine herself. The name of the younger sister, too, who acts no part in this story, appears again in the tale collected by Fornander of Kaulanapokii, where, like the wise little sister of Haleole's story, she is the leader and spokesman of her four Maile sisters, and carries her part as avenger by much more magical means than in Haleole's naturalistic conception. The character who bears the name of Haleole's sungod, Kaonohiokala, plays only an incidental part in Westervelt's story.]

      [Footnote 4: First generation: Waka, Kihanuilulumoku,

       Lanalananuiaimakua.

      Second generation: Moanalihaikawaokele, Laukieleula; Mokukeleikahiki and

       Kaeloikamalama (brothers to Laukieleula).

      Third generation: Kaonohiokala m. Laieikawai, Laielohelohe (m.

       Kekalukaluokewaii), Aiwohikupua, Mailehaiwale, Mailekaluhea,

       Mailelaulii, Mailepakaha, Kahalaomapuana.]

6. THE STORY AS A REFLECTION OF ARISTOCRATIC SOCIAL LIFE

       Table of Contents

      Such is the bare outline of the myth, but notice how, in humanizing the gods, the action presents a lively picture of the ordinary course of Polynesian life. Such episodes as the concealment of the child to preserve its life, the boxing and surfing contests, all the business of love-making—its jealousies and subterfuges, the sisters to act as go-betweens, the bet at checkers and the Kilu games at night, the marriage cortege and the public festival; love for music, too, especially the wonder and curiosity over a new instrument, and the love of sweet odors; again, the picture of the social group—the daughter of a high chief, mistress of a group of young virgins, in a house apart which is forbidden to men, and attended by an old woman and a humpbacked servant; the chief's establishment with its soothsayers, paddlers, soldiers, executioner, chief counselor, and the group of under chiefs fed at his table; the ceremonial wailing at his reception, the awa