amongst the people; and a new journal of more ambitious pretensions and of more enlarged views has just been started, also in native, under the name of the Hoku o Ka Pakipika-The Star of the Pacific.'

On a retrospect of the moral changes which have taken place in the Hawaiian people, we are struck with the extreme vigour with which, in the year 1820, the nation liberated itself from the thraldom of an ancient and universal idolatry. It was an act which stands alone upon the page of history. The whole transaction remains

'A truth so strange, 'twere bold to think it true,

If not still bolder far to disbelieve.'

The overthrow of idolatry shows that the Hawaiian race possesses not only great energy of character but some unusual idiosyncrasies, capable of being turned to bad or good account. There was a dumb and sceptical reasoning going on in the popular mind about their pantheon, its worthlessness, its falsity. The system was withering in their estimation, and required but a spark to enkindle it with a destructive fire, in which it was consumed with the rapidity of a heap of crackling thorns and dry leaves. Then their hatred to it as a system broke out again, and the unutterable groanings which their spirits had been subject to under the oppression of priestcraft, and especially the tabu institution, found a voice in action. With regard to idolatry itself, whatever may have been the best aspect of paganism, seen in the halo of Grecian art and intellectual cultivation, with uncivilized peoples it always takes the form of a cruel and bloodthirsty system. The King of Dahomy, who sacrifices two thousand victims at once as a holocaust to his deceased father; the Tahitian king,

TRANSITION OF CHARACTER.

417

who was accustomed to tread on the warm bodies of slain men each time he landed on any of his islands; and the mis-shapen idol Pelé of the Hawaiians, to which rites of blood were performed, are among the instances of this general tendency. In Hawaii it has been seen that the whole structure fell to pieces at the first glimmering approach, the faintest twilight rays of Christianity and mental enlightenment,- or rather, before the watching eye could detect in the sky any beams of the Sun of Righteousness. The trooping ghosts were ready to retire and crouch in their congenial darkness.

Ἐν δὲ φάει καὶ ὄλεσσον.

The change of character produced by the abolition of idolatry, and the reception of Christian truths imperfectly understood, and Christian practice imperfectly accepted as it was, was marked and wonderful. From a fierce people delighting in war, the Hawaiians became gentle and peaceable; their very countenance softened in expression, and hospitality and kind affections sprang up vigorously throughout the islands. It was not, however, that the people became saints or sages. Their hearts were not the rasa tabula which the religious theorist so earnestly desires. They were pages scribbled over with many evil and stubborn lines which had first to be erased. But still there is something very hopeful in that mixed character. The Hawaiians are not dull and torpid; and they can love; that is something. Let it be seen what will be the effect upon the nation at large as the services and teaching of the Church are generally extended among them; services that have a warmth in them; which give the worshippers a part to take; that symbolize with decent forms and sympathetic

EE

attitudes the humiliation, the gratitude, the praise, the petition, as they come in their oft-repeated round. Let it be seen what the effect upon their minds will be when gathered within the walls of a temple solemn yet cheerful, cared for, but accessible to all at all times--a church in which art walks as the handmaid of religion, and never arrogates to herself the higher place. Let them mingle their voices with the diapasons of the organ; let them hear the invitation of the bell as it chimes its gracious welcome. Let spire, and cross, and ornate doorway be there, and a meaning be set on each part, till the people come to love the gift which this country is prepared to make them, and say of their Church, This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven!'

As the preceding account of the resources and trade of Hawaii was going to press, I received the commercial statistics for the year 1865, and they show a large advance in production and general prosperity. The quantity of sugar exported had increased to 15,318,097 lbs. (6,838 tons), or nearly 50 per cent. more than the previous year. Coffee 263,705 lbs., or five times the growth of 1864. The total exports in 1865 were in value $1,569,894, against $1,113,329 in 1864, an excess of nearly 30 per cent. It is a significant fact in favour of the internal prosperity of the islands that the imports remained the same as the year before, and they now exceed the exports by less than two millions of dollars. The cultivation of cotton is quite recent in the islands, and is yet in its infancy. In 1864, about a ton weight of cotton, of fine quality, had been shipped; in 1865, 11,750 lbs. were exported, or nearly four times the

quantity. The Custom-house receipts for the last year were $192,566; showing an enlargement of upwards of thirty-three thousand dollars compared with the preceding period.

The value of real estate had shown a corresponding rise; and in some districts the value of land had doubled itself in the twelve months.

A line of Steamers has just been established between California and the Islands; and the first vessel of the California Steam Navigation Company, the Ajax,' has arrived with a hearty welcome, at Honolulu. The Hawaiian Steam Company is taking measures to keep up a more rapid and constant inter-island communication with their boats.

CHAPTER XXVI.

KALELEO-KA-LANI; THE FLIGHT OF THE CHIEF.'

THE

HE dynasty of Kaméhaméha seemed firmly established. The royal stirps had taken root, and was bearing noticeable fruit. Four kings of the name had occupied the time from 1782 to 1862, i.e. eighty years; which in a country not famous for longevity was in itself a remarkable circumstance. And there was yet a grandson of the first Kaméhaméha, under thirty years of age, the elder brother of the King, on whom the government would devolve in failure of the direct heir, the young Prince of Hawaii.

The feeling of the people towards the Prince Royal was already love and pride, rather than hope. They had him in possession, so that hope seemed to have no proper place in their hearts. For hope differs from love in this respect, that, even when perfect, hope does not cast out fear, and hath torment--sometimes unutterable; and her heaven has always, somewhere, its threatening cloud.

Nor was it alone to his people that the boy prince was an object of great interest. All foreigners in the islands or elsewhere who wished well to Hawaii, and were led from any circumstance to watch her efforts towards advancement, saw in the youthful successor of the fourth Kaméhaméha the laying of another stone on the