“ I am thus led back to the proposition which I have already enunciated, that, whichever was the branch of the great Polynesian family, that in ages long past first settled upon these islands and here remained and increased, yet about twenty-eight generations ago, and for several generations succeeding, there arrived here an influx of new-comers from the same Polynesian family, who through their superior intellectual and physical prowess obtained the supremacy,—politically, morally and socially,—brought with them their genealogies, their religion, and their customs ”

“ The poisoned arrow hit its mark, and Kahahana returned to Oahu filled with mistrust and suspicion of his faithful high-priest. A coolness arose between them. Kahahana withdrew his confidence from, and slighted the advice of the high-priest, who retired from the court to his own estate in Waialua and Waimea, and caused himself [287] and all his people and retainers to be tatooed on the knee, as a sign that the chief had turned a deaf ear to his advice. ”

“ The character of Peleioholani has been variously described in the traditions that have come down from his time. The Hawaii and Maui traditions, or reminiscences, of Peleioholani describe him as proud, arrogant, overbearing—proud, even beyond the most exacting Hawaiian etiquette. Molokai traditions acknowledge his prowess as a warrior, but are merciless in the condemnation of him as a tyrant, whose cruelty went even a step beyond what those cruel times considered admissible. ”

“ The Tonga Islands have a tradition, recorded by Mariner, that Tangaloa, one of their principal gods, had two sons, of which the elder was called Tupo, the younger, Vaka-ako-uli. The first was indolent and shiftless, the other industrious and prosperous. Jealousy induced the former to kill the other. Then Tangaloa called the older brother and the family of the younger before him and thus addressed the latter: “Your bodies shall be fair, as the spirit of your father was good and pure; take your canoes and travel to the eastward and all good things attend you.” ”

“ An era of national unrest and of tribal commotion seems to have set in from causes not now known. A migratory wave swept the island world of the Pacific, and left its traces on the genealogies of the chiefs, in the disuse of old and substitution of new names for places and landmarks, in the displacement of old, and setting up of new tutelar gods with enlarged rites of worship and stricter kapus. Chiefs from the southern groups visited the Hawaiian group, and chiefs from the latter visited the former, accompanied by their relatives, priests and retainers. ”

“ It is rather singular that while most of the principal groups of the Polynesian family claim, each for itself, the honor of being the first-created of mankind and, so to say, autochthones on their respective islands—as the Tonga, Samoan, Society and Hawaiian Islands—with the exception of the legend of Hawaii Loa, the Marquesans alone own to a foreign birthplace and a migration from a far-off land. ”

“ As regards the first settlers of the Hawaiian Islands, I am led to believe that they came from the Samoan group, through the Tahiti and Marquesas Islands; in other words, that the Tahitians came from Samoa, the Marquesans from Tahiti, and the Hawaiians from the Marquesans. The Marquesans have legends and traditions which pretend to describe their wanderings in olden times, but the Hawaiians have none but that their gods came from Tahiti. ”

“ After reading Professor Müller’s “Lectures on the science of language” there can be little doubt that the Sanskrit of the Vedas is centuries older than the time of Solomon; that centuries more must be allowed for the development and formation of the Sanskrit, as in the Vedas, before we reach the time when the Sanskrit or its great great ancestor was spoken in that simplicity which it at one time possessed, when that and the Polynesian stood together as cognate dialects of a still older speech. ”

“ I have read with a great deal of interest the efforts made by various writers in the Hawaiian journals to restore and to publish the traditions, histories, songs and sagas, pertaining to the Hawaiian people. They have a value and being far greater than many would at first conceive of, whether historically, ethnologically or philologically considered; and their preservation and critical collation and analysis are objects well worthy of the time and trouble of men of leisure and ability. ”

“ The earth being created from an egg, referred to by Ellis as a Hawaiian tradition, is a Brahmin dogma. The different versions of the flood, current among the Polynesian tribes, north and south, had their probable origin in the Brahmin legend of Satyuorata, the seventh Manu, who alone with his family escaped the deluge that destroyed the rest of mankind.
The story of the fountain of youth and life—the “wai-ola-loa a Kane”—if not of Brahmin origin, was widely upheld by them, and was well known—mutatis mutandis—to the Polynesians. ”

“ Up to this time Hawaiian history is merely a register of names with only here and there a passing allusion to some event, barely sufficient to give a locus standi to some prominent name, such as the building and inauguration of Kukaniloko as a royal birth-place by Nanakaoko and his wife Kahihiokalani. This however must have happened close upon the twelfth century, for their son and grandson—Kapawa and Heleipawa—were no doubt contemporaries with Maweke or with Pili-Kaaiea. ”

“ That the memory of the northern Hawaii should in process of time, and after the cessation of this period of intercourse, have faded from the minds of southern chiefs and bards, or been confounded with that of the Samoan Sawaii, is natural enough; though I think it possible, were Tahitian, Tongan and Samoan legends—if yet existing—properly compared with each other and with the Hawaiian, that many proofs may yet be drawn from that side of the frequent intercourse, hostile, or friendly, of those days between the northern and southern groups of the Pacific. ”

“ The Menehunes were a numerous and powerful race, the ancestors of the present Hawaiian people.
This is the legend of Kane Hoa Lani Lua Nuu: Kane (the god) ordered Lua Nuu to go up on a mountain and perform a sacrifice there. Lua Nuu looked among the mountains of Kahikiku, but none of them appeared suitable for that purpose. Then Lua Nuu inquired of God where he might find a proper place, and God replied to him: “Go, travel to the eastward and where you find a sharp-peaked hill projecting precipitously into the ocean, that is the hill for the sacrifice.” ”

“ Taking then thirty years as the measure of a generation, and the Nanaulu straight line, as the least inflated and most reliable, we have twenty-six generations from the time of Maweke to the present time, which places Maweke at the commencement of the twelfth century, say A.D. 1100. And during that century those great migrations to and fro with their resultant influx of new men and new ideas occurred. ”

“ Some peoples counted time by the number of generations from some common ancestor; some counted by the length of reign of each successive king or chief; some counted each individual year within a, by them, generally adopted era. The Hawaiians counted by generations of their principal chiefs or kings. They started from Wakea as a common ancestor of all the chiefs on all the islands of the Hawaiian group; but, for convenience or clearness sake, time was counted by either of the reigning families on the four principal islands: Kauai, Oahu, Maui, or Hawaii. ”

“ The legends about Maui, his adventures, his fishing up the earth from the water, his getting fire, his fish-hook, Manaiakalani, are many and mostly coincide with the Hawaiian legends. (See Grey’s “Polynesian Mythology.”) Those legends of Maui were recognized and more or less known through all the Polynesian groups, and hence probably arrived with the first settlers. One of the New Zealand traditions has it that the three Mauis concurred in the creation of man and, subsequently, of woman from him. On Hawaii and on the Society group a similar legend, mutatis mutandis, obtained. ”

“ How far any distinct remembrance of the Siwa worship may be traced in Polynesian traditions and customs is not easy to determine precisely. The blood-thirsty wife of Siwa still survives in name and attributes in the Tongan God of War, Kaliai-tu-po. The name itself of Siwa recurs in the Polynesian word Hiwa, primarily “dark colored, black or blue;” secondarily, “sacred,” as a sacrificial offering. In different dialects the word occurs as Siwa, Hiwa, or Heiwa, and is applied as an adjective with derivative meanings, but in all the idea of sacredness underlies and characterizes its application. ”

“ The old nobility of Molokai, the descendants of Maweke of Nuakea, of Keoloewa, circumscribed in territorial possessions certainly, but as lofty and as pure in its blue blood as any of Oahu or Kauai were, with the exception of one family destroyed, despoiled and exiled by Peleioholani of Oahu in vengeance for the death of his daughter, Kulanihonuaiakama, who was treacherously killed by some chiefs of windward Molokai. ”

“ After creation this man Honuaula, was given a place to live in, called in olden time Kalana i Hauola, in later times it was called Pali-uli. So runs the legend of Kumu-Honua, and he dwelt alone at first without a wife.
The gods seeing the man without a wife, descended on earth, put him into a sleep, took out one of his ribs (lalo puhaka) and made it into a woman. They then awakened the man who found the woman on his right side, and she was called Ke Ola Ku Honua. ”

“ Tali-ai-tubo is the god of war. Tui-fua-Bolotu presided over the divine assembly at Bolotu, but is less in power than the preceding. Hihuleo is a powerful god, worshiped by the Tui-Tonga family. Tubo-Toti, is the god of voyages. Alai Valu is the god consulted in sickness. Alo-Alo is the god of wind, rain, seasons and vegetation. Tangaloa, is the god of arts and inventions. Hala-Api-Api, Togui Uku, Mea and Tubo-Bugo are gods of the sea and voyages.
The universe reposes on the body of the god Maui. He is the giant among the gods, but has no temple nor priests. ”

“ Thus, on New Zealand testimony, Hema, Kahai, Wahieloa and Laka were chiefs of Hawaiki or Sawaii in the Samoan group, and not of Hawaii in this group. These names and their pedigrees must then have been carried from Hawaiki to Tahiti and from Tahiti to this group, unless we assume a direct settlement from Hawaiki to Hawaii.
It is true, certainly, that the Hawaiian legends ascribe a local habitation as well as a name to each of these four chiefs, either on Maui, Oahu or Kauai, and places and monuments connected with their names are existing to this day ”

“ The expression eia kuu maka, used as a mark of submission or devotion to another, most likely refers to some such ancient custom, but neither that nor cannibalism were practised in Hawaii, at least no trace of them remains in their traditions.
A New Zealand chief’s wife frequently hung herself on the death of her husband. There was no law or absolute necessity for so doing, but it was a custom whose observance was much applauded as the mark of a true and devoted wife.
In New Zealand the awa root is not used as a beverage, as in the other Polynesian tribes. ”

“ That they are of the same race that now inhabit the eastern and southern parts of Polynesia is beyond a doubt. That that race was settled in the Asiatic Archipelago centuries before the Christian era, I believe to be equally certain; but whether the emigration into Polynesia took place before the Christian era, or was occasioned by the invasion of the forefathers of the Malay family from India about the commencement of that era, there is nothing, that I am aware of, either in Polynesian, Malayan or Hindu traditions to throw any light upon. ”

“ When the earth had been made and all things on it, man was created, as previously stated, and he was placed on the land called Kalana i Hauola; a beautiful, fertile land stocked with fruits and tame animals. It was also called Aina Hemolele a Kane, also Kapakapaua a Kane. (Its situation on earth seems to have been to the east of those who made the legend—“Kahiki-ku.”) ”

“ Thus Hawaiian chronology was not very exact, it must be admitted; but to a people, who depended entirely upon the faithful memory of their bards and priests, it was sufficiently approximate to bring order and sequence in their unwritten records of the past. To us, of a later and more developed civilization, the exactitude of dates is of the very essence of history, or at least one of its most necessary elements; but an approximation to truth satisfied the ancient Hawaiian.
In my work, “The Polynesian Race, its Origin and Migrations,” Vol. ”

“ Men, women, and children were killed without discrimination and without mercy. The streams of Makaho and Niuhelewai in Kona, and that of Hoaeae in Ewa, are said to have been literally choked with the corpses of the slain. The native Oahu aristocracy were almost entirely extirpated. It is related that one of the Maui chiefs, named Kalaikoa, caused the bones of the slain to be scraped and cleaned, and that the quantity collected was so great that he built a house for himself, the walls of which were laid up entirely of the skeletons of the slain. ”

“ The worshipers of Kane were called “he papa laa” or “he papa Kane.” Those who worshiped images were called “he pae kii,” and those who worshiped nobody were called “he laa-luau.” The “laa-luau” were godless people, and in the time of Wakea and Papa, the first chiefs of the iku-nuu in this country, a number of worthless kapus were introduced to support the wickedness of Wakea.
In very olden times no human sacrifices were offered to Kane. “He kapu ke kanaka na Kane” was the settled law of that time, because the kanaka was considered sacred to Kane and like unto him. ”

“ The name for north and northeast wind is tokalau. In Hawaiian, koolau is the north and northeast side of an island. In Tahiti, toerau is the west and southwest.
Rev. Thos. Williams considers the Fiji group as the place of contact between the two races which occupy east and west Polynesia, or, “The Asiatic and African, but not Negro,” as he designated them. “The light Mulatto skin and well-developed muscles seen to windward are chiefly the result of long intercourse with the Tongan race.” “The Fijians have never acknowledged any power (foreign) , but such as exists among themselves.” ”

“ In Hawaiian tradition, there is no distinct remembrance, and but the faintest allusion to the fact that the islands were inhabited while the volcanoes on the leeward islands were still in an active state. It is impossible to judge of the age of a lava flow by its looks. Portions of the lava stream of 1840, flowing from Kilauea into Puna district of Hawaii, were in 1867 covered with a luxuriant vegetation ”

“ Though the historical thread which underruns these traditions is often overlaid with fables, superstitions and exaggerations, yet I contend that from the very nature of their independent sources they are a most valuable material from which to rehabilitate Hawaiian history for centuries anterior to Capt. Cook. The critical canon which refuses to build up history from tradition, and receives nothing but contemporary writers or monumental records as evidences of fact, seems to me more nice than wise under certain circumstances. ”

“ To explain the relation of these three classes of the nobility I would say that by “niau-pio” was understood the very highest cast, not only by descent but also by power, such as the sovereigns of the islands, the moi, their children—if the mothers were of sufficient rank—and the aimoku, or district chiefs. By pio was understood the children of a brother and sister or half-brother and half-sister, whose parents were both niau-pio. By naha was understood the children of a father with his daughter, or an uncle with his niece, both the parents being niau-pio. ”