Unwritten Literature of Hawaii Part 27

If the dignity and quality of the meles now used, or reported to have been used, in the hula _uli-uli_ are to be taken as any criterion of the quality and dignity of this hula, one has to conclude that it must be a.s.signed to a rank below that of some others, such, for instance, as the _ala'a-papa_, _pa-ipu_, _Pele_, and others.

David Malo, the Hawaiian historian, author of _Ka Moolelo Hawaii_,[246] in the short chapter that he devotes to the hula, mentions only ten hulas by name, the _ka-laau_, _pa'i-umauma_, _pahu_, _pahu'a_, _ala'a-papa_, _pa'i-pa'i_, _pa-ipu_, _ulili_, _kolani_, and the _kielei_. _Ulili_ is but another form of the word _uli-uli_. Any utterance of Malo is to be received seriously; but it seems doubtful if he deliberately selected for mention the ten hulas that were really the most important. It seems more probable that he set down the first ten that stood forth prominent in his memory.

It was not Malo's habit, nor part of his education, to make an exhaustive list of sports and games, or in fact of anything. He spoke of what occurred to him. It must also be remembered that, being an ardent convert to Christianity, [Page 108] Malo felt himself conscience-bound to set himself in opposition to the amus.e.m.e.nts, sports, and games of his people, and he was unable, apparently, to see in them any good whatsoever. Malo was a man of uncompromising honesty and rigidity of principles. His nature, acting under the new influences that surrounded him after the introduction of Christianity, made it impossible for him to discriminate calmly between the good and the pernicious, between the purely human and poetic and the depraved elements in the sports practised by his people during their period of heathenism. There was nothing halfway about Malo. Having abandoned a system, his nature compelled him to denounce it root and branch.

[Footnote 246: Translated by N.B. Emerson, M.D., under the t.i.tle "Hawaiian Antiquities," and published by the B.P.

Bishop Museum. Hawaiian Gazette Company (Limited), Honolulu, 1903.]

The first mele here offered as an accompaniment to this hula can boast of no great antiquity; it belongs to the middle of the nineteenth century, and was the product of some gallant at a time when princes and princesses abounded in Hawaii:

_Mele_

Aole i manao ia.

Kahi wai a o Alekoki.

Hookohu ka ua i uka, Noho mai la i Nuuanu.

5 Anuanu, makehewa au Ke kali ana i-laila.

Ea ino paha ua paa Kou manao i ane'i, Au i hoomalu ai.

10 Hoomalu oe a malu; Ua malu keia kino Mamuli a o kou leo.

Kau nui aku ka manao Kani wai a o Kapena.

15 Pani'a paa ia mai Na manowai a o uka; Ahu wale na ki'owai, Na papa-hale o luna.

Maluna a'e no wau, 20 Ma ke kuono liilii.

A waho, a o Mamala, Hao mai nei ehu-ehu; Pulu au i ka huna-kai, Kai heahea i ka ili.

25 Hookahi no koa nui, Nana e alo ia ino.

Ino-ino mai nei luna, I ka hao a ka makani.

He makani ahai-lono; 30 Lohe ka luna i Pelekane.

O ia pouli nui Mea ole i ku'u manao.

I o, i a-ne'i au, Ka piina la o Ma'ema'e, [Page 109] 35 E kilohi au o ka nani Na pua i Mauna-ala.

He ala ona-ona kou, Ke pili mai i ane'i, O a'u lehua ula i-luna, 40 Ai ono a na manu.

[Translation]

_Song_

I spurn the thought with disdain Of that pool Alekoki: On the upland lingers the rain And fondly haunts Nuuanu.

5 Sharp was the cold, bootless My waiting up there.

I thought thou wert true, Wert loyal to me, Whom thou laids't under bonds.

10 Take oath now and keep it; This body is sacred to thee, Bound by the word of thy mouth.

My heart leaps up at thought Of the pool, pool of Kapena; 15 To me it is fenced, shut off, The water-heads tightly sealed up.

The fountains must be a-h.o.a.rding, For skies are ever down-pouring; The while I am lodged up aloft, 20 Bestowed in the cleft of a rock.

Now, tossed by sea at Mamala, The wind drives wildly the surf; I'm soaked with the scud of the ocean, My body is rough with the rime.

25 But one stout hero and soldier, With heart to face such a storm.

Wild scud the clouds, Hurled by the tempest, A tale-bearing wind, 30 That gossips afar.

The darkness and storm Are nothing to me.

This way and that am I turning, Climbing the hill Ma'e-ma'e, 35 To look on thy charms, dear one, The fragrant buds of the mountain.

What perfume breathes from thy body, Such time as to thee I come close, My scarlet bloom of lehua 40 Yields nectar sought by the birds.

This mele is said to have been the production of Prince [Page 110] William Lunalilo--afterward King of the Hawaiian islands--and to have been addressed to the Princess Victoria Kamamalu, whom he sought in marriage. Both of them inherited high chief rank, and their offspring, according to Hawaiian usage, would have outranked her brothers, kings Kamehameha IV and V.

Selfish and political considerations, therefore, forbade the match, and thereby hangs a tale, the shadow of which darkens this song. Every lover is one part poet; and Lunalilo, even without the love-flame, was more than one part poet.

The poem shows the influence of foreign ways and teachings and the pressure of the new environment that had entered Hawaii, in its form, in the moderation of its language and imagery, and in the coherence of its parts; at the same time the spirit of the song and the color of its native imagery mark it as the product of a Polynesian mind.

According to the author's interpretation of the song, _Alekoki_ (verse 2), a name applied to a portion of the Nuuanu stream lower down than the basin and falls of _Kapena_ (_Kahiwai a o Kapena_--verse 14), symbolizes a flame that may once have warmed the singer's imagination, but which he discards in favor of his new love, the pool of Kapena. The rain, which prefers to linger in the upland regions of Nuuanu (verses 3 and 4) and which often reaches not the lower levels, typifies his brooding affection. The cold, the storm, and the tempest that rage at _Mamala_ (verse 21)--a name given to the ocean just outside Honolulu harbor--and that fill the heavens with driving scud (verses 27 and 28) represent the violent opposition in high quarters to the love-match. The tale-bearing wind, _makani ahai-lono_ (verse 29), refers, no doubt, to the storm of scandal. The use of the place-names _Ma'ema'e_ and _Mauna-ala_ seem to indicate Nuuanu as the residence of the princess.

_Mele_

PALE I

Auhea wale oe, e ka Makani Inu-wai?

Pa kolonahe i ka ili-kai, Hoonui me ka Naulu, Na ulu hua i ka hapapa.

5 Ano au ike i ke ko Hala-li'i, I keia wa nana ia Lehua.

PALE II

Aia i Waimea ku'u haku-lei?

Hui pu me ka wai ula iliahi, Mohala ta pua i ke one o Pawene; 10 Ka lawe a ke Koolau Noho pu me ka ua punonohu ula i ka nahele, Ike i ka wai kea o Makaweli; [Page 111] Ua noho pu i ka nahele Me ka lei hinahina o Maka-li'i.

15 Liilii ka uka o Koae'a; Nana i ka ua lani-pili, Ka o-o, manu le'a o ka nahele.

I Pa-ie-ie an, noho pu me ke anu.

E ha'i a'e oe t ka puana: 20 Ke kahuna kalai-hoe o Puu-ka-Pele.

[Translation]

_Song_

CANTO I

Whence art thou, thirsty wind, That gently kissest the sea, Then, wed to the ocean breeze, Playest fan with the breadfruit tree?

5 Here sprawl Hala-lii's canes, There stands bird-haunted Lehua.

CANTO II

My wreath-maker dwells at Waimea.

Partnered is she to the swirling river; They plant with flowers the sandy lea, 10 While the bearded surf, tossed by the breeze, Vaunts on the hills as the sun-bow, Looks on the crystal stream Makaweli, And in the wildwood makes her abode With Hinahina of silvern wreaths.

15 Koaea's a speck to the eye, Under the low-hanging rain-cloud, Woodland home of the plaintive o-o.

From frost-bitten Pa-ie-ie I bid you, guess me the fable: 20 Paddle-maker on Pele's mount.

This mele comes from Kauai, an Island in many respects individualized from the other parts of the group and that seems to have been the nurse of a more delicate imagination than was wont to flourish elsewhere. Its tone is archaic, and it has the rare merit of not transfusing the more crudely erotic human emotions into the romantic sentiments inspired by nature.

The Hawaiians dearly loved fable and allegory. Argument or truth, dressed out in such fanciful garb, gained double force and acceptance. We may not be able to follow a poet in his wanderings; his local allusions may obscure to us much of his meaning; the doctrine of his allegory may be to us largely a riddle; and the connection between the body of its thought and ill.u.s.tration and the application, or solution, of the poetical conundrum may be past our comprehension; but the [Page 112] play of the poet's fancy, whether childish or mature, is an interesting study, and brings us closer in human sympathy to the people who took pleasure in such things.

In translating this poem, while not following literally the language of the poet, the aim has been to hit the target of his deeper meaning, without hopelessly involving the reader in the complexities of Hawaiian color and local topography. A few words of explanation must suffice.

The _Makani Inu-wai_ (verse 1)--known to all the islands--is a wind that dries up vegetation, literally a water-drinking wind.

The _Naulu_ (verse 3) is the ordinary sea-breeze at Waimea, Kauai, sometimes accompanied by showers.

_Hala-li'i_ (verse 5) is a sandy plain on Niihau, and the peculiarity of its canes is that they sprawl along on the ground, and are often to a considerable extent covered by the loose soil.