letter XL] NATIVE HOSPITALITY. 



103 



in her shining hair. You would have been amused to see me 

 shaking hands with men dressed only in malos, or in the 

 short blue shirt reaching to the waist, much worn by them 

 when at work. 



I rode my mare with some pride of proprietorship, and our 

 baggage for a time was packed on the mule, and we started up 

 the tremendous pali at the tail of a string of twenty mules and 

 horses laden with kalo. This was in the form of paiai, or hard 

 food, which is composed, as I think I mentioned before, of the 

 root baked and pounded, but without water. It is put up in 

 bundles wrapped in ti leaves, of from twenty to thirty pounds 

 each, secured with cocoanut fibre, in which state it will keep 

 for months, and much of the large quantity raised in Waipio is 

 exported to the plantations, the Waimea ranches, and the neigh- 

 bouring districts. A square mile of kalo, it is estimated, would 

 feed 15,000 Hawaiians for a year. 



It was a beautiful view from the top of the pali. The white 

 moon was setting, the earliest sunlight was lighting up the dewy 

 depths of the lonely valley, reddening with a rich rose red the 

 huge headland which forms one of its sentinels ; heavy snow 

 had fallen during the night on Mauna Kea, and his great ragged 

 dome, snow-covered down to the forests, was blushing like an 

 Alpine peak at the touch of the early sun. It ripened into a 

 splendid joyous day, which redeemed the sweeping uplands of 

 Hamakua from the dreariness which I had thought belonged 

 to them. There was a fresh sea-breeze, and the sun, though 

 unclouded, was not too hot. We halted for an early lunch at 

 the clean grass-house we had stopped at before, and later in 

 the afternoon at that of the woman with whom we had ridden 

 from Hakalau, who received us very cordially, and regaled us 

 with poi and pork. 



In order to avoid the amenities of Bola Bola's we rode thirty- 

 four miles, and towards evening descended the tremendous 

 steep, which leads to the surf-deafened village of Laupahoehoe. 

 Halemanu had given me a note of introduction to a widow 

 named Honolulu, which Deborah said began thus, " As I know 

 that you have the only clean house in L," and on presenting it we 

 were made very welcome. Besides the widow, a very redundant 

 beauty, there were her two brothers and two male cousins, and 

 all bestirred themselves in our service, the men in killing and 

 cooking the supper, and the woman in preparing the beds. It 

 was quite a large room, with doors at the end and side, and 

 fully a third was curtained off by a calico curtain, with a 



