292 



HA WAIL 



[LETTER XXXI. 



my last impressions even more delightful than my first. The 

 people are as genial as their own sunny skies, and in more 

 frigid regions I shall never sigh for the last without longing for 

 the first 



S. S. Costa Kica, August jtA. 



We sailed for San Francisco early this afternoon. Every- 

 thing looked the same as when I landed in January, except 

 that many of the then strange faces among the radiant crowd 

 are now the faces of friends, that I know nearly everyone by 

 sight, and that the pathos of farewell blended with every look 

 and word. The air still rang with laughter and alohas, and 

 the rippling music of the Hawaiian tongue ; bananas and 

 pineapples were still piled in fragrant heaps; the drifts of 

 surf rolled in, as then, over the barrier reef, canoes with 

 outriggers still poised themselves on the blue water; the 

 coral divers still .plied their graceful trade, and the lazy 

 ripples still flashed in light along the palm-fringed shore. 

 The head-ropes were let go, we steamed through the violet 

 channel into the broad Pacific, Lunalilo, who came out so far 

 with Chief Justice Allen, returned to the shore, and when 

 his kindly aloha was spoken, the last link with the islands 

 was severed, and half an hour later Honolulu was out of 

 sight 



. . . . The breeze is freshening, and the Costa Rica's 

 head lies nearly due north. The sun is sinking, and on the 

 far horizon the summit peaks of Oahu gleam like amethysts on 

 a golden sea. Farewell for ever, my bright tropic dream ! 

 Aloha nui to Hawaii-nei ! 



I. L. B. 



