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this kind made, but I cannot help doubting the policy of not allowing 

 any of the burden of it fall upon the natives themselves — the parents. 

 The only argument advanced in justification of this course, was the 

 rather unsatisfactory one, that these people cannot understand and 

 appreciate sufficiently the advantages, to be persuaded to contribute 

 to the education of their children. As far as my own observations 

 went, I believe this to be an error. As long as the children are 

 educated and maintained gratis, the natives will never make any 

 exertions to furnish the means. Some of the natives said to me, on 

 my making inquiry why their children were not at the seminary, 

 that they could not get them there, for all those admitted were 

 selected by the missionaries, and there are no other means of tuition ; 

 they also added, that they would be willing to contribute a few 

 dollars for the education of their children, if allowed. 



The greatest objection to the system of this school, in my opinion, 

 is that the pupils are not taken at an earlier age, and before their 

 habits are in any way formed, and that it is attempted to educate 

 them exclusively for civilized life as it now is. Taken at too advanced 

 an age, they have scarcely an opportunity of forgetting the life of 

 ease they led while in their savage .state ; and tlius, their early im- 

 pressions remaining still uneradicated, they return almost as soon as 

 they leave the school to their savage state, finding it more easy than 

 to keep up their partially civilized habits; whereas, if they were 

 taken very young, and put under a course of discipline that would 

 make their improvement permanent, and were, besides, taught the 

 way of maintaining themselves as they now are, by useful employ- 

 ment, they would not be so likely to relapse into their former habits, 

 or adopt those of their parents. I have little doubt that such a course 

 would be a great means of reforming many of the parents, as far as 

 they are susceptible of reformation ; for the relation between parents 

 and children is altogether different with them from what it is among 

 us, parents being invariably under the control of the children, after 

 the latter have grown up. 



The plan of taking the children, as is done, from the dregs of the 

 natives, is, I think, another mistake. The higher orders in a mo- 

 narchial system of government ought to be more carefully instructed 

 than the others. This principle is admitted by the establishment of 

 the chiefs' school at Honolulu, and I see no reason why it should not 

 equally apply to the children of the petty chiefs, or second class. I am, 

 indeed, satisfied that greater advantages would be derived from such 



