242 Poniaudcr t'ollccfioit of Hazcaiiaii I'olk-lorc. 



mean any of the Central or Sontli Polynesian Islands. Moreover, when he says that he 

 there saw the "haole" — the white-skinned man — the inference is plain that it was not a 

 Tahiti inhabited by kindreds of his own race; for the South Pacific Tahitis had not then 

 I)een taken possession of, or settled uixin by Europeans. The prol)a1)ility therefore is 

 strong- that the Tahiti he refers to was either the western coast of Mexico or Manila 

 where the Sjianiards were settled and held possession. 



I have no doubt that the ancient Hawaiians had a knowledge of the mainland of 

 America — at jiresent Mexico or California — and that they designated it under the rather 

 indefinite appellation of Kiikitht Tahiti — the farthest ends of foreign lands; — but that 

 knowledge was acquired before that coast was occu])ied by the Spaniard, for the meles 

 and legends which refer to it make no mention of the "haole" up to the time of Kualii. 



J. How did Kualii get to Tahiti ? The intercourse between this group and other 

 groups of Polynesia or the American mainland of which the older meles s])eak so fre- 

 quently, had ceased many generations before Kualii's time, and Hawaiian navigation 

 was then limited to the seas and islands comprising the group. Even the Kauai rovers, 

 noted as the most daring and skilful throughout the group, had lost the knowledge or the 

 means of going to Tahiti. I have shown that Kualii lived within the i^eriod when the 

 Spanish-Manila trade from the Mexican coast was at its height. It is historically on rec- 

 ord that the Spanish discovered this group about 1542; it is traditionally on record that 

 Spaniards (for no other foreigners or "haoles" then navigated the North Pacific) were 

 cast away on Hawaii within a range of twenty years, above or below that period ; and there 

 are reasons for believing that more than one galleon, during the time of the Spanish mo- 

 nopoly of the Manila trade, either visited the islands directly, or went so near to them as 

 to be able to pick ofif any natives who might have been at sea in their canoes at the time of 

 the passing" of the galleon. 



Though Hawaiian tradition is silent as to the manner in which Kualii visited Ta- 

 hiti the land of the "haole," it is jwsitive as to the fact; and the only reasonable explana- 

 tion I can offer is that a Spanish galleon in passing these islands picked up Kualii, at sea 

 or ashore, voluntarily or as a hostage, and returned him on its next trip. And what was 

 thus done in one instance, and of which tradition has been retained because the object of it 

 was one of the highest chiefs in the country, whose renown in after times filled the land 

 from one end to the other, may have occurred in other instances before or since with men 

 of lesser note of whom tradition is silent or has been lost. 



Probably the best informed Hawaiian archaeologist of the present day is S. M. 

 Kamakau, but even he is often very credulous, inconsistent and uncritical. He has pub- 

 lished, through the various newspapers, several genealogies of the ancient chiefs, but be- 

 yond the time of Umi-a-Liloa of Hawaii, Piilani of Maui and Kaihikaini-a-Manuia and 

 Kakuhihewa of Oahu, his love of antiquity often lead him into irreconcilable difficulties. 

 For instance, when Lauli-a-laa, the son of Laamaikahiki, who is forty-sixth from Haloa 

 on the Ulu and Puna-inma line of descent, is represented as having married Maelo (w), 

 daughter of Kuolono, and who is thirty-fourth on the Nanaulu straight line from Flaloa, 

 there is evidently either a large gap in the Nanaulu line or a corresponding increase by 

 the insertion of collateral branches in the Puna-imua line. When Kelea, the wife of Ka- 

 lamakua, the thirty-ninth on the Nanaulu straight line, is represented as the sister of Ka- 



