1 86 Ka Hana Kapa. 



the advent of foreigners came all these things, and also the cotton cloth (long cloth), 

 and the adaptation of ends to means was amusing — I have seen a pocket formed 

 b}' knotting a corner of the front pendent malo; once also a native who had been at 

 work on a schooner on which I had been traveling, now at anchor, was seen to tie the 

 dollar he received as wage in the corner of his malo and jump overboard to swim 

 ashore. Pockets could thus be had without trousers. 



From the manner of wearing the malo passed between the legs it was important 

 that the material be soft and not very thick ; with the pa'u no such necessity existed 

 and female fancy might (and often did) increase the simple dress shown in Fig. no 

 by adding many layers of kapa of indefinite length. While I have seen no specimen 

 consisting of more than seven sheets, and few that exceed three, Mrs. Lucy G. 

 Thurston, one of the pioneer missionaries to these islands, with whom I have often 

 discussed events and manners of the olden time natives as the}- turned from their 

 broken kapu and discredited idolatr}- to the new religion brought b}- the foreigners, 

 describes in her autobiograph}- '^ the largest pa'u I have heard mentioned. It was in 

 1820 at Kailua on Hawaii, on the occasion of a feast given b}- King Liholiho ( Kameha- 

 meha II) to commemorate the death of his father Kamehameha I.'" 



"The King appeared in a military dress with quite an exhibition of roA'alty. 

 Kamamalu, his favorite cjueen [who afterwards died with him in England] applied to 

 me for one of my dresses to wear on the occasion; but as it was among the impossibles 

 for her to assume it, the request called for neither consent nor denial. She, however, 

 according to court ceremou}-, so arranged a native cloth pa'u a j-ard wide, with ten 

 folds, as to be enveloped round the middle with seventy thicknesses. To array her- 

 .self in this unwieldy attire, the long cloth was spread out on the ground, wl.en, 

 beginning at one end, she laid her body across it, and rolled herself over and over 

 till she had rolled the whole around her. Two attendants followed her, one bearing 

 up the end of this cumbrous robe of state, aud the other waving over her head an 

 elegant nodding fly-brush [kahili J of beautiful plumes, its long handle completely 

 covered with little tortoise shell rings of various colors. 



" Her head was ornamented with a graceful 3'ellow wreath of elegant feathers, 



of great value A mountain vine [maile] with green leaves, small and lustrous, 



was the only drapery which went to deck and cover her neck and the upper part of 

 her person. Thus this noble daughter of nature, at least six feet tall and of comely 

 bulk in proportion, presented herself before the king and the nation, greatly to their 



"'Life and Times of Mrs. Lucy G. Thurston, wife of Rev. .\sa Thurston, Pioneer Missionar)- to the Sandwich 

 Islands. .\\\\\ .\rbor, Mich., 1882. p. 41. 



"The Hawaiians are accustomed to celebrate the dcathday of friends or relatives rather than tlie birthday. 

 Thus we hear of a rousing feast given on the lirst anniversary of the death of an onlv child. 



