620 HAWAIIAN ROMANCE OF LAIEIKAWAI [ETH. ANN. 33 
coral for white, lava for black. The smallest board in the museum collection 
holds 96, the largest, of wood, 180 men: The board is set up, leaving one space 
empty, and the game is played by jumping, the color remaining longest on the 
board winning the game. AKonane was considered a pastime for chiefs and was 
accompanied by reckless betting. An old native conducting me up a valley in 
Kau district, Hawaii, pointed out a series of such evenly set depressions on the 
flat rock floor of the valley and assured me that this must once have been 
a chief’s dwelling place. : 
*The malo is a loin cloth 3 or 4 yards long and a foot wide, one end of 
which passes between the legs and fastens in front. The red malo is the chief’s 
badge, and his bodyguard, says Malo, wear the girdle higher than common and 
belted tight as if ready for instant service. Aiwohikupua evidently travels in 
disguise as the mere follower of a chief. 
*Tn Hawaiian warfare, the biggest boaster was the best man, and to shame 
an antagonist by taunts was to score success. In the ceremonial. boxing con- 
test at the Makahiki festivities for Lono, god of the boxers, as described by 
Malo, the “ reviling recitative”’ is part of the program. In the story of Kawelo, 
when his antagonist, punning on his grandfather’s name of “ cock,” calls him 
a “mere chicken that scratches after roaches,” Kawelo’s sense of disgrace is 
so keen that he rolls down the hill for shame, but luckily bethinking himself 
that the cock roosts higher than the chief (compare the Arab etiquette that 
allows none higher than the king), and that out of its feathers, brushes are 
made which sweep the chief’s back, he returns to the charge with a handsome 
retort which sends his antagonist in ignominious retreat. In the story of Lono, 
when the nephews of the rival chiefs meet, a sparring contest of wit is set up, 
depending on the fact that one is short and fat, the other long and lanky, 
“A little shelf for the rats,” jeers the tall one. ‘ Little like the smooth quoit 
that runs the full course,” responds the short one, and retorts “ Long and 
lanky, he will go down in the gale like a banana tree.” “ Like the ea banana 
that takes long to ripen,” is the quick reply. Compare also the derisive chants 
with which Kuapakaa drives home the chiefs of the six districts of Hawaii 
who haye got his father out of favor, and Lono’s taunts against the revolting 
chiefs of Hawaii. 
* The idiomatic passages “aohe puko momona o Kohala,” ete., and (on page 
387) “e huna oukou i ko oukou mau maka i ke aouli” are of doubtful interpre- 
tation. 
* This boast of downing an antagonist with a single blow is illustrated in 
the story of Kawelo. His adversary, Kahapaloa, has struck him down and is 
leaving him for dead. “Strike again, he may revive,’ urge his supporters. 
Kahapaloa’s refusal is couched in these words: 
“He is dead; for it is a blow from the young, 
The young must. kill with a blow 
Else will the fellow go down to Milu 
And say Kahapaloa struck him twice, 
Thus was the fighter slain.” 
All Hawaiian stories of demigods emphasize the ease of achievement as a 
sign of divine rather than human capacity. 
CHAPTER V 
* Shaking hands was of foreign introduction and marks one of the several 
inconsistencies in Haleole’s local coloring, of which “the deeds of Venus” is 
the most glaring. He not only uses such foreign coined words as wati, 
