Lani's mother, Kamaka, was a sprightly woman of about thirty-five and did her part to make "life in the woods" pleasant. Neither mother nor daughter appeared to have many household cares and seemed to take delight in wandering up and down the valley in quest of land shrimps, which they caught in a cornucopia-shaped basket made of wicker work. These, with the little black fish named oopu which they found adhering to the stones in the brook, and a fern frond called pohole, together with poi, the Hawaiian staff of life, constituted the principal part of their diet. They were also very fond of pig and chicken and never begrudged the labor or time spent in getting up a luau. From them we had an insight into the Hawaiian mode of living and were surprised to note to what an extent the natives are dependent on the sea for a livelihood. Sometimes Nui would take a day off, whether the master liked or not, and take his family to the beach, when they employed themselves in fishing. They would return with the greatest assortment of shell-fish and fish of many sizes of the most varied colors. Also they would bring limu of several kinds and odors. Limu, you know, is seaweed, and there appear to be as many varieties of it as there are of ferns on the land. There is also a variety of it found in the streams adhering to the rocks on the bottom, which we were always taught to beware of at home, but which the natives eat with cooked meats with great gusto.
They always kept a store of kukui nuts, which they roasted; then breaking up the kernels fine and mixed with salt, they ate it as a relish.
The women took delight in adorning themselves with leis, made either of the maile, which grew in profusion on the steep sides of the ravines, or of the palapalai, a luxuriant fern which clothes the valleys as with a garment. Sometimes they would make leis of the fruit of the hala tree, the pandanus, which was also very plentiful in that part of the island. Sometimes they would inter-twine the bright hala fruit and the fragrant glossy leaves of the maile, which made a very beautiful lei, especially on an olive skin as a background.
Often we were called in to eat with them and learned to like almost all their native dishes. It was always the custom to call in any stranger passing, to share their food with them. Their style of cooking, viz: under ground, or in a saucepan over an open fire, seemed to give the food a piquancy which had charms for us.
Lani had a very sweet voice and accompanied her singing with a guitar, which she played very sweetly and many an evening we passed about the campfire very comfortably. She could yodel like an inhabitant of the Swiss Alps and often we would hear her singing and yodeling as she came up the valley to cross up to the tableland where we were cutting the large koa trees, preparatory to hauling them to the mill to turn into the handsome lumber so much sought after for making fine furniture. There was not a man in the camp who was not charmed with her.
There was a little Chinaman who came up through our valley, leading pack horses, whose business was buying pepeiao, an ear-shaped fungus which is found very plentiful on the trunks of decayed trees on the windward sides of all the islands. The natives gathered and dried these and were always glad to see the Chinaman come around, as they were enabled to exchange them for either cash or the sweet cakes which he carried in his panniers. This fungus contains a good deal of gelatinous matter and was formerly largely exported to China, where it is used for soup making. This poor little waif of a Celestial, named Leong Sing, fell in love with our Lani at first sight and the frequent occasions he took for wandering up our valley were not warranted by the inextensive trade which he found. He made the acquaintance of a Chinaman who had a camp in a neighboring valley, where he was making charcoal from the branches of the koa trees, which he purchased from us. He got to staying over night with his friend and would sometimes join our campfire of an evening and listen to Lani's singing. None of us suspected him of the effrontery of falling in love with our Lani or of expecting her to reciprocate his affection. While at work one day in the woods her father told us that the Chinaman had proposed and wanted to carry her off to Lahaina, where his uncle had a large store. This was a greater temptation to Lani than we suspected, as she was very fond of good clothes and the Chinese are noted for taking the best of care of their wives in that respect. Also was not Lahaina the capital, where young people were numerous and where her accomplishments would be appreciated?
Her father had higher aspirations for his daughter and wished that she might marry a haole.
There was a young man in camp, named Frank Willoughby, (evidently a purser's name) who had come round the Horn in a whaler and had decamped as soon as the vessel touched at Honolulu, as many of our best and worst men did. Frank had a good education and was a very fine looking, healthy young fellow of a most amiable disposition. When Frank heard of the Chinaman's proposal he said he would kill the saffron-colored Celestial on sight and break every bone in his body for his presumption. Then we knew that Frank was badly smitten.
But he was not the only one who was struck bad, as there was a young half Hawaiian-Portuguese named Joe Edwards who was also very denunciatory of the Chinaman and expressed a wish for his speedy demise. Some of us had noticed that Frank was jealous of Joe, as the latter could play the ukeke or Hawaiian Jew's harp, very well, and as a stranger cannot tell what the player is singing on the instrument to his dulcinea, Frank could not understand how far Joe had got along in his courtship.
There was another party who was heels over head in love with Lani and this was so utterly unexpected that when the denouement took place, "you might knock us all down with a feather." This was a big hulk of a black Portuguese named Shenandoah, from his having been captured on a whaler by that Confederate pirate when on her marauding excursion amongst the whalers in the Arctic, from whence he was returned to Honolulu with many others. He was a most repulsive, villainous-looking scoundrel, with black warts on his face; an Iago who could never capture our Desdemona and consequently never came into our calculations.