CHAPTER V
[Footnote 29: Shaking hands was of foreign introduction and marks one of the several inconsistencies in Haleole's local coloring, of which "the deeds of Venus" is the most glaring. He not only uses such foreign coined words as wati, "watch," and mare, "marry," but terms which are late Hawaiian, such as the triple canoe, pukolu, and provision boat, pelehu, said to have been introduced in the reign of Kaméhaméha I.]
[Footnote 30: Famous Hawaiian boxing teachers kept master strokes in reserve for the pupils, upon whose success depended their own reputation. These strokes were known by name. Compare Kawelo, who before setting out to recapture Kauai sends his wife to secure from his father-in-law the stroke called wahieloa. The phrase "Ka ai a ke kumu i ao oleia ia oukou" has been translated with a double-punning meaning, literal and figurative, according to the interpretation of the words. Cold-nose's faith in his girdle parodies the far-fetched dependence upon name signs common to this punning race. The snapping of the end of his loin cloth is a good omen for the success of a stroke named "End-that-sounds"! Even his supporters jeer at him.]
[Footnote 31: Few similes are used in the story. This figure of the "blood of a lamb," the "blow like the whiz of the wind," the moo ploughing the earth with his jaw "like a shovel," a picture of the surf rider—"foam rose on each side of his neck like a boar's tusks," and the appearance of the Sun god's skin, "like a furnace where iron is melted," will, perhaps, cover them all. In each the figure is exact, but ornamental, evidently used to heighten the effect. Images are occasionally elaborated with exact realization of the bodily sensation produced. The rainbow "trembling in the hot rays of the sun" is an example, and those passages which convey the lover's sensations—"his heart fainted with love," "thick pressed with thunders of love," or such an image as "the burden of his mind was lifted." Sometimes the image carries the comparison into another field, as in "the windings and twistings of his journey"—a habit of mind well illustrated in the occasional proverbs, and in the highly figurative songs.]
[Footnote 32: The Polynesians, like the ancient Hebrews, practiced circumcision with strict ceremonial observances.]
[Footnote 33: The gods invoked by Aiwohikupua are not translated with certainty, but they evidently represent such forces of the elements as we see later belong among the family deities of the Aiwohikupua household. Prayer as an invocation to the gods who are called upon for help is one of the most characteristic features of native ritual, and the termination amama, generally accompanied by the finishing phrases ua noa, "it is finished," and lele wale aku la, "flown away," is genuine Polynesian. Literally mama means "to chew," but not for the purpose of swallowing like food, but to spit out of the mouth, as in the preparation of awa. The term may therefore, authorities say, be connected with the ceremonial chewing of awa in the ritualistic invocations to the gods. A similar prayer quoted by Gill (Myths and Songs, 120) he ascribes to the antiquity of the story.]
[Footnote 34: The laau palau, literally "wood-that-cuts," which Wise translates "war club," has not been identified on Hawaii in the Bishop Museum, but is described from other groups. Gill, from the Hervey Islands, calls it a sharpened digging stick, used also as a weapon. The gigantic dimensions of these sticks and their appellations are emphasized in the hero tales.]
[Footnote 35: The Hawaiian cloak or kihei is a large square, 2 yards in size, made of bark cloth worn over the shoulders and joined by two corners on one side in a knot.]
[Footnote 36: The meaning of the idiomatic boast he lala kamahele no ka laau ku i ka pali is uncertain. I take it to be a punning reference to the Pali family from whom the chief sprang, but it may simply be a way of saying "I am a very high chief." Kamahele is a term applied to a favorite and petted child, as, in later religious apostrophe, to Christ himself.]