PREFACE 



The collection of Hawaiian legends of which a translation is given in 

 the following pages represents the work of many years by William Hyde 

 Rice of Kauai. However, it is only within the last few years that Mr. 

 Rice has translated the legends from his Hawaiian manuscripts. He has 

 tried to make his version as literal as possible, preserving at the same time 

 the spirit of the original Hawaiian, its flavor, rhythm, and phrasing. He 

 has avoided adding modern embroidery of fancy, as well as figures of 

 speech foreign to the Hawaiian language and to its mode of thought and 

 expression. 



For the furtherance of this aim, Mr. Rice has spent much of the past 

 year in a complete review of his translation, adding and rejecting, and in 

 every way attempting to approximate the spirit and letter of the Hawaiian. 



Mr. Rice has been exceptionally well prepared for this work, as he has 

 been familiar with the Hawaiian language from his earliest childhood. In 

 fact until he was twenty, he never thought in English but always in 

 Hawaiian, translating mentally into his mother tongue. In 1870 when he 

 became a member of the House of Representatives, during the reign of 

 Kamehameha V, Governor Paul Kanoa and S. M. Kamakau, the historian, 

 lx)th well-known Hawaiian scholars, gave Mr. Rice much help with his 

 Hawaiian, especially teaching him the proper use of various complicated 

 grammatical constructions, and explaining" obscure variations in pronuncia- 

 tion and meaning. 



The sources of the legends in this collection are varied. A number of 

 the stories Mr. Rice remembers having heard as a child, and other rarer 

 ones were gathered in later years. Many are from more than one source, 

 but have corresponded even in details, and almost word for word. The 

 legend of Kamapuaa, for instance, is one of the first which Mr. Rice 

 remembers hearing. When a boy, the places mentioned in this story were 

 pointed out to him : the spot where the demi-god landed, where he found 

 the hidden spring, and where he rooted up the natives' sugar-cane and 

 sweet potatoes. The story of "The Small Wise Boy and the Little Fool" 

 he has also been familiar with since childhood. The places mentioned in 

 this tale can likewise be pointed out. 



Most of the legends are from Kauai sources, but a number have been 

 gathered from the other islands of the group. Whenever Mr. Rice heard 

 of an old Hawaiian who knew any legends, he went to him, sometimes 

 going to several to trace a special story, as for instance, the "Jonah and 

 the Whale" story, "Makuakaumana", which after a long search he finally 

 procured from Mr. Westervelt. This curious story seems to be more 

 modern than the others of the collection. While hunting for a reliable 



