Kiana: a Tradition of Hawaii

by James Jackson Jarves

Olmedo started up and looked around for some means of defence, but before he could even call for help, Tolta’s men, at a signal from him, had seized and bound him. Taking him upon their shoulders in silence, they left the house and rapidly bore him towards Pohaku’s quarters. His mouth and eyes being bandaged, he was unable to cry out or to obtain any clue to his route. They hurried him on, and early in the morning, bruised by their rough handling, he found himself deposited on the ground apparently in a house, and there left by himself.

Tolta had now obtained one great object, which was to secure Olmedo in the fortress, while Beatriz, equally in his power, was removed from the immediate presence of Pohaku.

Hewahewa, the father of Liliha, was the high-priest of Pele. Second only to Pohaku in authority, he was his superior in influence, from his position as the chief minister of the goddess. Himself a skeptic, believing in none of the grosser superstitions of the people, and using them merely as a source of power, he was indifferent to everything but his own ambition. His lands were the best cultivated, and his tenantry the most favored of all this portion of Hawaii, because being tabu, the wars and anarchy which so generally prevailed spared them. Rigorous in conforming to all the rites of his fearful worship, he expiated his external hypocrisy by inward contempt. But his mind, though intelligent, had never conceived any purer system, and only busied itself in scheming to turn the national mythology to his individual profit. He was the rival of Pohaku, but for the present coalesced with him. Not being of the highest blood, he was obliged to rely for his influence mainly upon his increasing importance as a priest, but was slowly making his way to supreme rule, aided much by the tyranny of Pohaku, to whose capricious cruelties his studied suavity and mildness afforded a contrast greatly to his advantage. Liliha was his only child. He loved her tenderly, and by this tie only was he connected with true humanity. No other being had sufficient influence to move him to any action not calculated from selfish policy. She at times made him susceptible to feeling by her impulsive nature, so prone to joy and kindly emotions, from her affinity with all she found fair and good. This was little at the best, but she kept that little fresh and active from her own fountain of affections, and it appeared brighter and more winsome from the dark shadows about her.

She was the idol of her immediate attendants, and though capricious from unregulated authority, yet they had nothing to fear. Her father, so far from seeking to instil into her mind the vulgar faith, left her free to her own intuitions. She believed in the beautiful and sublime nature she so loved to look upon, and felt there had been given her in it a varied and limitless source of enjoyment. Not that she reasoned much upon anything, but she was so quick to recognize all that was innocent and virtuous, under the circumstances of her life, that her heart and mind were ever developing in the right direction. Her religion, therefore, was not the result of thought, but the spontaneous action of an untrammelled soul, that instinctively attracting to itself good in preference to evil, spoke the faith in actions which it was powerless to frame in words. She knew nothing of a personal God, yet, had any one explained to her his existence, she would have listened as if it were nothing new, and rejoiced in a higher mental satisfaction than she had before realized. Quick to perceive, she had acquired from her father, almost without his will, his disbelief in the demon origin of the terrific phenomena of nature in their vicinity, and looked upon them as fearlessly as upon the placid ocean or the tiny sea shell. Why should she fear? Had she not been born among them? Like herself, they were the creation of some unseen power, who ruled all! So her few years had gone by kindly and lovingly, with health coursing in every vein, and happiness overflowing her heart.

As soon as Tolta had secured Olmedo, he hastened to announce to Pohaku his success. That grim chief was not in the best humor upon learning the death of so many of his warriors, by the new flow of the crater. “A poor exchange this, is it not, Hewahewa,” said he turning to that person; “so many of our fighting men for this foreign priest and his woman. But let us see the prize that has cost so much.”

The three passed to the hut in which Olmedo was confined. His bandages were removed, and he found himself in their presence. Pohaku looked at him as he would have at a strange animal, and marvelling at his long robes and the effeminate air they gave him, said to Tolta, “You Mexicans must have been less than women to have been conquered by such a race as this. Would you have my warriors fight them? I have a mind to tie you to him and toss you both into the crater. Kiana would have been a prey worth a legion of such as this long-robed, pale-faced she.”

Tolta’s hand nervously sought the dagger he wore, but prudence restrained him, and he quietly replied, “The Spanish chief has for the while escaped. He will soon enough give you a chance to feel his stroke in battle. Till then spare your taunts. Their priests are women in looks, but devils in deeds. If you would see the faces of their soldiers, look there,” and he tossed out of a bag before him the ghastly heads of the three Spaniards.

Even Pohaku was surprised at their long grisly beards and fierce faces, scarred by wounds, and bronzed by a score or more of years of constant adventure and warfare. “These may have been men,” said he, “but my soldiers would have soon rolled their heads in the dust,” at the same time kicking them scornfully, not choosing to remember that some of his best warriors had within the past year fallen by their blades. “Guards,” he added, “take this carrion away, and put it up over the eastern gate of the fortress,—’twill be a fit target for our boys. As for you, puny priest, you are destined for Pele. Thank your gods you are to be so honored.”

“Chieftain,” replied Olmedo, “the God I serve will protect me living or dying. I am indeed a man of peace, but fear not the sword. Death has no terrors, for it opens to me a heaven, such as your idolatry can never know. In your delusion and ignorance you are to be pitied—not me. You shall see how calmly a Christian can die. Perhaps it will lead you to ask what it is to be a Christian.”

“I will tell you what it is to be a Christian, Pohaku, for none know better than my countrymen,” broke in Tolta. “It is to rob, to murder, to burn, to ravish, to lie, to torture, to destroy the sacred images and break down the altars of the gods; to demolish towns and to waste fields; to breed famine and pestilence. All this, for gold and conquest, have the Spaniards, cursed be their mothers, brought upon Mexico in the name of their god, and this will they bring to you, O chief! Even if you welcome them to your bosom, as did our sovereign, Montezuma, they will imprison and spurn you to your death, or they will broil you on hot coals as they did the emperor Guatimotzin, to make you confess riches that you have not. Yet they say their god is merciful and full of love. See, here is the lying image,” and snatching the crucifix from Olmedo’s neck, he handed it contemptuously to Pohaku, who, putting it curiously to his ear, said, “It does not talk. How does it give you power to do all this? Pele thunders and destroys. She speaks, and we listen. She is silent, and we fill her with gifts to buy her good will. But this bit of wood is dumb. Pele eats the ocean and the earth,—mountains and rivers she swallows. She is a dread goddess, and must be worshipped or we perish. Here, take your god,” added he, disdainfully flinging it towards Olmedo, “to-morrow we will give Pele a rare meal. You and your god shall she feast upon.”