Consecrating the House. 103 



salt, with occasionally a fish, constitute their general food ; while all else that they grow, or take, 

 and every result of their labour, goes to meet the series of taxes levied by the king, aud his gov- 

 ernors, and their own respective chiefs. 



Again (p. 152), on tlie beach south of the mission premises in Honolulu, he reports: 



The largest hut I passed was not higher than my waist : capable only of containing a family, 

 like pigs in a sty, on a bed of dried grass, filled with fleas and vermin. Not a bush or shrub was to 

 be seen around; or any appearance whatever of cultivation. It was the time of their evening 

 repast, and most of the people were seated on the ground, eating poi surrounded by swarms of 

 flies, and sharing their food with dogs, pigs, and ducks, who helped themselves freely from the dishes 

 of their masters ! 



All accounts of the homes of the common people about the towns agree that at 

 the time foreigners came to these islands after the voyage of Vancouver, the people 

 were most wretchedly provided. In the country, and along the shores remote from 

 town, the houses were cleaner and better built, if not much larger. I found, a dozen 

 years ago, a few miles north of Kailua, Hawaii, a hut such as Stewart describes. An 

 aged woman was sitting in it (she could not have stood up) and was busy scraping pan- 

 danus leaves for mats. She was reputed to be several years beyond the hundred mark. 



The thatched house of a respec^lable man may not become a dwelling place until 

 the kahuna pule or priest has blessed the work; a tuft of grass remains over the door- 

 way which he must cut at the time of blessing. This ceremony did not take place 

 until the house was furnished and the owner quite read}^ to move in ; in some places, 

 however, the priest was required to sleep a night in the new house before the owner, 

 that all evil spirits might be thoroughly exorcised. I do not care here to enlarge upon 

 this religious rite, as I hope to do that in another place, but I may be permitted to 

 quote the two prayers given by Dr. Emerson in his notes to Malo, premising that 

 there was no required formula, each priest using such expressions as the particular 

 case might suggest. Thus, if the owner claimed descent from some god or demigod 

 that being was referred to in compliment to the owner : or if the owner was a fisherman 

 Kuula might properly be invoked to help bless the house, etc. 



The priest stood at the door with all the friends and neighbors of the owner 



around in readiness for the feast that was to follow, and holding in one hand the stone 



adze, and in the other a block of wood, preferably a kapa beater or some other worthy 



domestic implement, chopped the grass when he came to the proper place in the prayer. 



This tuft shows over the centre of the door in Fig. 85. The tuft was called the piko 



or umbilicus of the house, and the whole ceremony ka oki ana o ka piko o ka hale or 



cutting the umbilical cord of the house. The Hawaiians observed peculiar ceremonies 



at their similar operation on the new-born child. Other peoples have also observed in 



their own way this marking the individual existence of the new life : to mention only 



[287J 



