NATIVE TRADITIONS. 
251 
posed the heavens to be, in form of a hollow cone, 
joined to the sea. He also visited Kirauea, and 
made proposals to become the guest and suitor of 
Pele, the elder sister. When she saw him stand¬ 
ing on the edge of the crater, she rejected his pro¬ 
posals with contempt, calling him a hog, the son 
of a hog. On her ascending from the crater to 
drive him away, a fierce combat ensued. Pele 
was forced to her volcano, and threatened with 
destruction from waters of the sea, which Tama- 
puaa poured into the crater till it was almost full, 
and the fires were nearly extinct. Pele and her 
companions drank up the waters, rose again from 
the craters, and finally succeeded in driving Tama- 
puaa into the sea, whither she followed him with 
thunder, lightning, and showers of large stones. 
They also related the account of the destruction 
of part of Keoua’s camp by a violent eruption of 
the volcano, which, from their description, must 
have been sudden and awful. 
Pele, they said, was propitious to Tamehameha, 
and availed herself of the opportunity afforded by 
the contiguous encampment of Keoua to diminish 
his forces, and aid the cause of his rival. We 
asked why Keoua was unpopular with Pele. They 
said, “ We do not exactly know. Some say, he 
had not sent sufficient offerings to the heiaus; 
others, that he had no right to make war against 
Tamehameha, as he had before concluded a treaty 
of peace with him; and others, that he had broken 
the tabu of the place by eating the oheloes, mark¬ 
ing and disturbing the sand, or pulling up a sacred 
kind of grass growing in the neighbourhood.” 
Whatever was the cause, Pele, they said, was 
“ huhu roa ,” exceedingly angry, and, soon after 
sun-set, repeatedly shook the earth with the most 
