Kauai contained once the most important coffee-plantations; and the large sugar-plantation of Princeville at Hanalei was originally planted in coffee. But this tree or shrub is so subject to the attacks of a leaf-blight that the culture has decreased. Yet coffee grows wild in many of the valleys and hills, and here and there you find a small plantation of a few hundred trees which does well. The coffee shrub thrives best in these Islands among the lava rock, where there seems scarcely any soil; and it must be sheltered from winds and also from the sun. I have seen some young plantations placed in the midst of forests where the trees gave a somewhat dense shade, and these seemed to grow well.
CHAPTER V.
THE HAWAIIAN AT HOME: MANNERS AND CUSTOMS.
As we rode one day near the sea-shore I heard voices among the rocks, and sending the guide ahead with the horses, I walked over to the shore with the lady and children who were my companions. There we saw a sight characteristic of these islands. Three women decently clothed in a garment which covered them from head to foot, and a man with only a breech-clout on, were dashing into the surf, picking up sea-moss, and a little univalve shell, a limpet, which they flung into small baskets which hung from their shoulders. They were, in fact, getting their suppers, and they were quite as much surprised at our appearance as we at theirs. They came out politely, and showed the children what was in their baskets; the man, understanding that our horses had gone ahead, kindly volunteered to pilot us over the rocks to a village near by. I do not imagine that he was embarrassed at his lack of clothing, and after the first shock of surprise I am quite sure we were more inclined to admire his straight muscular figure and his shining dark skin than to complain of his nakedness. Presently, however, he slipped away into the bush, and re-appeared in a hat, and a shirt which was so short that even my little girl burst into laughter at this ridiculous and futile effort toward decency; and thus arrayed, and with the kindly and gracious smile which illuminates a Hawaiian's face when he puts himself to some trouble on your account, this funny guide led us to our horses.
In the evening I related this incident to our host, an old resident, and said, "I suppose this man could read?" "Read!" he replied; "he can read and write as well as you. I know him very well; he is a prosperous man, and is to be the next justice of the peace in that district. He doubtless went home and spent the remainder of the afternoon in reading his newspaper."
Native life in the Islands is full of such contrasts, and I found, on examining the labor contracts on several sugar-plantations, that almost without exception the working people signed their own names.
According to a census taken in December, 1872, the Hawaiian Islands contained 56,897 souls, of whom 51,531 were natives and half-castes, and 5366 were foreigners. In six years the native population had decreased 7234, and the foreigners had increased 1172. Since 1866, therefore, the Islands have lost 6062 souls.