HIIAKA’S ADDRESS TO CAPE KAENA
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Emerson, Nathaniel Bright
Then comes my herald of peace, with
Its ear-tingling10 message of love,
Offering bounty and pardon as free
As the wind that shakes the hala tree.
Drawn is the bolt and open the door
Of the secret chamber under the sea,
Revealing the tricks of the merfolk twain,
Their bodies dead as the corpse of King Log,
And with them that of the Mermaid Queen;
For a ray has pierced to their resting place,
As a lightning flash illumines the deep.
You’re caught, my fellows, you’re caught!
Neither Kua nor Kahole-a-Kane were relieved of their guilty fears by Hiiaka’s soft words. They continued their flight along the same path which was soon afterwards followed by Hiiaka in her climb to Poha-kea. The only penalty inflicted by Hiiaka, when at last she came up with them and found them penitent, cowering in the brush, was their retirement from the ocean: not a light stroke, however, being almost the equivalent of taking away a mariner’s commission, thus separating him from his chosen element, his native air.
Source notes
1Kai-a-ulu, a sea-breeze that comforted Waianae. ↑
2Kane-pu-niu, a form of god Kane, now an uncarved bowlder; here used in a tropical sense to mean the head. The Hawaiians, impelled by the same vein of humor as ourselves, often spoke of the human head as a coconut (pu-niu). ↑
3Kona, here used as a local name for the sea-breeze. ↑
4Koolau-wahine, a wind, stronger, but from the same direction as the Kona. ↑
5 The author begs to remark that sunstroke is unknown in all Hawaii. ↑
6Lau-a’e, a fragrant plant that grows in the woods of Kauai. ↑
7Akua. The word akua was used not alone to designate the gods, it was also applied to any superhuman or supernatural being. The reference here is to the little creatures that swarmed in the land. ↑
8Oe. This last line is evidently addressed to her traveling companion, Wahine-oma’o, whom she descried in the canoe in the offing. ↑
9Huli ke alo i ka paia. To sleep with one’s face turned to the wall was reckoned to indicate a high degree of confidence in one’s safety. ↑
10Ula, a tingling in the ears. Tinnitus aurium, a tingling in the ears, or any similar symptom in that organ was regarded as a sure sign that some person was making a communication from a distance. This superstition, or sentiment, in regard to tinnitus aurium was not peculiar to the Polynesian. In Der Trompeter von Säckingen I find the following:
Laut das Ohr klingt, als ein Zeichen,
Dass die Heimath sein gedenket,—
↑
11Pahele-hala, literally, shaking the hala (pandanus tree). Hala also meant fault or sin. The figure is to be taken to mean a shaking of sins, in other words, a casting of them away, a disregarding of them. ↑
12Wai-lua, an abyss in the water. The reference is, of course, to the shark-gods. ↑
13Laau, wooden. The reference is to the shark-bodies of the two monsters which became dead, wooden, when discarded by them on their coming out of the ocean and resuming ordinary human form. ↑
14Lehua. The full name is Moana-nui-ka-lehua, a goddess (mermaid) whose domain was in the abyss of the Ieie-waena channel. For further details see remarks in the text. ↑