52 
SANDWICH ISLANDS. 
Keopuolani, the king’s mother, a woman of strong sense, the 
highest birth, and extremely beloved by all classes of people, 
and especially by the queen, her daughter-in-law; who in 
her last illness scarcely ever left her, or would allow any 
body but her husband to share with her in performing her 
dutiful attentions to his parent. This great chief, the most 
honoured wife of Tamehameha I., died early in 1823. Her 
loss would have been still more felt by the mission had not 
another female chief, whose name is so like hers that they 
have sometimes been confounded, already taken up the 
cause. This is Kapeolani, wife of Nahi, the hereditary 
orator or Senaschie of the Sandwich Islands. She was 
baptized about the time of the queen’s death, and since 
that period all her influence and authority have been exer¬ 
cised in favour of the new faith # . Nothing like force how¬ 
ever has been employed, and the religion of the Prince of 
Peace has proceeded gently but steadily to purify the 
morals and improve the manners of an intelligent, cheerful, 
and sweet-natured people. 
As the mind of the young king improved he became 
more and more aware of the difference between his people 
and the Europeans, and his anxiety to lessen that difference 
* The character of this extraordinary woman will be more fully dwelt upon 
in the sequel. 
