298 



HAWAII. 



a leper teacher. There is a store, too, where those who are 

 assisted by their friends can purchase small luxuries, which are 

 sold at just such an advance on cost as is sufficient to clear 

 the expense of freight. The taste for ornament has not died 

 out in either sex, and women are to be seen in Kalawao, 

 hideous and bloated beyond description, decorated with Ids 

 of flowers, and looking for admiration out of their glazed and 

 goggle eyes. 



King Kalakaua and Queen Kapiolani have paid a visit to 

 the settlement, and were received with hearty alohas, and the 

 music of a leper band. The king made a short address to the 

 lepers, the substance of which was " that his heart was grieved 

 with the necessity which had separated these, his subjects, 

 from their homes and families, a necessity which they them- 

 selves recognised and acquiesced in, and it should be the 

 earnest desire of himself and his government to render their 

 condition in exile as comfortable as possible." While he spoke, 

 though it is supposed that a merciful apathy attends upon 

 leprosy, his hideous audience showed signs of deep feeling, and 

 many shed tears at his thoughtfulness in coming to visit those, 

 who, to use their own touching expression, were " already in 

 the grave." 



The account which follows is from the pen of a gentleman 

 who accompanied the king, and visited the hospital on the 

 same occasion, in company with two members of the Board of 

 Health. 



" As our party stepped on shore, we found the lepers assem- 

 bled to the number of two or three hundred — there are 697 all 

 told in the settlement — for they had heard in advance of our 

 coming, and our ears were greeted with the sound of lively 

 music. This proceeded from the ' band,' consisting of a drum, 

 a fife, and two flutes, rather skilfully played upon by four 

 young lads, whose visages were horribly marked and dis- 

 figured with leprosy. The sprightly airs with which these poor 

 creatures welcomed the arrival of the party, sounded strangely 

 incongruous and out of place, and grated harshly upon our 

 feelings. And then as we proceeded up the beach, and the 

 crowd gathered about us, eager and anxious for a recognition 

 or a kind word of greeting — oh, the repulsive and sickening 

 libels and distorted caricatures of the human face divine upon 

 which we looked ! And as they evidently read the ill-con- 

 cealed aversion in our countenances, they withdrew the half- 

 proffered hand, and slunk back with hanging heads. They 



