326 HAWAIIAN ROMANCE OF LAIEIKAWAI (ETH. ANN. 83 
and actions of everyday life were the symbols employed. For the 
heightened language of poetry the same chiefly strain was culti- 
vated—the allusion, metaphor, the double meaning became essential 
to its art; and in the song of certain periods a play on words by pun- 
ning and word linking became highly artificial requirements.’ 
Illustrations of this art do not fall upon a foreign ear with the 
force which they have in the Polynesian, because much of the skill 
lies in tricks with words impossible to translate, and often the jest 
depends upon a custom or allusion with which the foreigner is un- 
familiar. It is for this reason that such an art becomes of social 
value, because only the chief who keeps up with the fashion and the 
follower who hangs upon the words of his chief can translate the 
allusion and parry the thrust or satisfy the request. In a Samoan 
tale a wandering magician requests in one village “to go dove catch- 
ing,” and has the laugh on his simple host because he takes him at 
his word instead of bringing hima wife. Ina'Tongan story * the chief 
grows hungry while out on a canoe trip, and bids his servant, “ Look 
for a banana stall on the weather side of the boat.” As this is the 
side of the women, the command meant “ Kill a woman for me to 
eat.” The woman designed for slaughter is in this case wise enough 
to catch his meaning and save herself and child by hiding under the 
canoe. In Fornander’s story a usurper and his accomplice plan the 
moment for the death of their chief over a game of konane, 
the innocent words which seem to apply to the game being ut- 
tered by the conspirators with a more sinister meaning. The lan- 
guage of insults and opprobrium is particularly rich in such double 
meanings. The pig god, wishing to insult Pélé, who has refused his 
advances, sings of her, innocently enough to common ears, as a 
“woman pounding noni.” Now, the noni is the plant from which 
red dye is extracted; the allusion therefore is to Pélé’s red eyes, and 
the goddess promptly resents the implication. 
It is to this chiefly art of riddling that we must ascribe the stories 
of riddling contests that are handed down in Pelynesian tales. The 
best Hawaiian examples are perhaps found in Fornander’s Aepakai- 
liula. NWere the hero wins supremacy over his host by securing the 
answer to two riddles—* The men that stand, the men that le down, 
the men that are folded,” and “Plaited all around, plaited to the 
bottom, leaving an opening.” The answer is in both cases a house, 
for in the first riddle “the timbers stand, the batons lie down, the 
grass is folded under the cords”; in the second, the process of thatch- 
ing is described in general terms. In the story of Pikoiakaala, on the 
other hand, the hero puzzles his contestants by riddling with the 
word “rat.” This word riddling is further illustrated in the story 
1 See Moerenhout, 11, 210; Jarves, p. 34; Alexander in Andrews’ Dict., p. xv1; Ellis, 1, 
288; Gracia, p. 65; Gill, Myths and Songs, p. 42. 
2 Fison, p. 100. 
