LETTERS FROM HAWAII 



forlorn, weary set, but were provided with an excellent 

 dinner, beautifully served, and I assure you we appre- 

 ciated it. We sat down sixteen at table. It was to that 

 house that we three were invited for the two days which 

 we must pass in waiting for our steamer, but we thought 

 it better to continue on here, where we should all be at 

 hand to take the vessel, instead of coming five miles at a 

 still earlier hour. We had a restful, pleasant two hours 

 or more there, and then finished our journey in a new 

 way. There is a narrow-gauge railroad from the planta- 

 tion to Punaluu, built to carry freight. Over that we 

 passed in an ' observation car,' no cover, sitting in two 

 lines, back to back, and propelled most of the way by 

 gravity alone. A man held the brakes and watched very 

 carefully, for it was entirely dark by this time. Some of 

 our party were very nervous, but it was a rest after all 

 the rough jolting, and the stars were glorious. We were 

 much favored in the weather all that day. It was the 

 first time in a week that rain had not pursued us, and 

 called for waterproofs, etc. For the last two miles we 

 were drawn by mules, and at last found ourselves at our 

 journey's end. This is a comfortable house, kept by a 

 Norwegian who has married a half-white. Both speak 

 English well, and are very civil and attentive ; there is no 

 one here but our party. 



" Nineteen years since this place was badly shaken by 

 earthquakes, and a tidal wave swept over where the hotel 

 now stands, carrying away the houses and the little 

 church, which was then nearer the sea. Mr. Foster told 

 us of one day he had passed when there were 360 shocks 

 in twenty-four hours. His hanging-lamp did not cease 

 to vibrate for half an hour! It is a fearful region to 

 dwell in. 



" Last night Mr. Emerson brought in the oldest man 

 in the vicinity to tell what he remembered of such scenes. 

 He was a white-headed, venerable man, seemingly bright 

 in his faculties, though he says he was a man grown and 

 married when the missionaries came so he must be 

 eighty-five or more. Mr. Emerson and Mr. Bishop 

 talked with him freely in his native tongue, and it was an 

 interesting scene. Mr. Emerson told him that father 

 was a rock-rending sorcerer (he used the native name for 

 sorcerer) from a great school in America, ' a sorcerer who 



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