1 68 HAWAII. [letter xvn, 



accent and intonation were pleasing, and there was a briskness 

 and emulation about their style of answering questions, rarely- 

 found in country schools with us, significant of intelligence and. 

 good teaching. All but the younger girls spoke English as 

 fluently as Hawaiian. I cannot convey a notion of the blithe- 

 ness and independence of manner of these children. To say 

 that they were free and easy would be wrong ; it was rather the 

 manner of very frolicksome daughters to very indulgent mothers 

 or aunts. It was a family manner rather than a school manner, 

 and the rule is obviously one of love. The Sisters are very 

 wise in adapting their discipline to the native character and 

 circumstances. The rigidity which is customary in similar in- 

 stitutions at home would be out of place, as well as fatal here, 

 and would ultimately lead to a rebound of a most injurious 

 description. Strict obedience is of course required, but the 

 rules are few and lenient, and there is no more pressure of dis- 

 cipline than in a well-ordered family. The native amusements 

 generally are objectionable, but Hawaiians are a dancing 

 people, and will dance, or else indulge in less innocent pas- 

 times ; so the Sisters have taught them various English dances, 

 and I never saw anything prettier or more graceful than their 

 style of dancing. There is no uniform dress. The girls 

 wear pretty print frocks, made in the English style, and several 

 of them wore the hibiscus in their shining hair. Some of the 

 elder girls were beautiful in face as well as graceful in figure, 

 but there was a snaky undulation about their movements which 

 I never saw among Europeans. All looked bubbling over with 

 fun and frolic, and there was a refinement and intelligence 

 about their expression which contrasted favourably with that ot 

 the ordinary female face on the islands. 



There are two dormitories, excellently ventilated, with a 

 four-post bed, with mosquito-bars, for each girl, and the beds 

 were covered with those brilliant-coloured quilts in which the 

 natives delight, and in which they exercise considerable in- 

 genuity as well as individuality of taste. One Sister sleeps in 

 each dormitory, and these highly-educated and refined women 

 have no place of retirement except a very plain oratory ; and 

 having taken the vow of poverty, they have of course no pos- 

 sessions, none of the books, pictures, and knick-knacks where- 

 with others adorn their surroundings. Their whole lives, with 

 the exception of the time passed in the oratory, are spent with 

 the girls, and in visiting the afflicted at their homes, and this 

 through eight blazing years, Avith the mercury always at 8o°. 



