The frigate, which was here to take the place of the Predpriatie, was not however ready for sea until the 1st March of the following year, and Kotzebue turned the delay to account by visiting the Sandwich Islands, where he cast anchor off Waihou in December, 1824.
The harbour of Hono-kourou or Honolulu is the safest of the archipelago; a good many vessels therefore put in there even at this early date, and the island of Waihou bid fair to become the most important of the group, supplanting Hawaii or Owhyee. The appearance of the town was already semi-European, stone houses replaced the primitive native huts, regular streets with shops, café, public-houses, much patronized by the sailors of whalers and fur-traders, together with a fortress provided with cannon, were the most noteworthy signs of the rapid transformation of the manners and customs of the natives.
Fifty years had now elapsed since the discovery of most of the islands of Oceania, and everywhere changes had taken place as sudden as those in the Sandwich Islands.
"The fur trade," says Desborough Cooley, carried on with the north-west coast of America, "has effected a wonderful revolution in the Sandwich Islands, which from their situation offered an advantageous shelter for ships engaged in it. Among these islands the fur-traders wintered, refitted their vessels, and replenished their stock of fresh provisions; and, as summer approached, returned to complete their cargo on the coast of America. Iron tools and, above all, guns were eagerly sought for by the islanders in exchange for their provisions; and the mercenery traders, regardless of consequences, readily gratified their desires. Fire-arms and ammunition being the most profitable stock to traffic with were supplied them in abundance. Hence the Sandwich islanders soon became formidable to their visitors; they seized on several small vessels, and displayed an energy tinctured at first with barbarity, but indicating great capabilities of social improvement. At this period, one of those extraordinary characters which seldom fail to come forth when fate is charged with great events, completed the revolution, which had its origin in the impulse of Europeans. Tame-tame-hah, a chief, who had made himself conspicuous during the last and unfortunate visit of Cook to those islands, usurped the authority of king, subdued the neighbouring islands with an army of 16,000 men, and made his conquests subservient to his grand schemes of improvement. He knew the superiority of Europeans, and was proud to imitate them. Already, in 1796, when Captain Broughton visited those islands, the usurper sent to ask him whether he should salute him with great guns. He always kept Englishmen about him as ministers and advisers. In 1817, he is said to have had an army of 7000 men, armed with muskets, among whom were at least fifty Europeans. Tame-tame-hah, who began his career in blood and usurpation, lived to gain the sincere love and admiration of his subjects, who regarded him as more than human, and mourned his death with tears of warmer affection than often bedew the ashes of royalty."
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One of the guard of the King of the Sandwich Islands. (Fac-simile of early engraving.) |
Such was the state of things when the Russian expedition put in at Waihou. The young king Rio-Rio was in England with his wife, and the government of the archipelago was in the hands of the queen-mother, Kaahou Manou.
Kotzebue took advantage of the latter and of the first minister both being absent on a neighbouring island, to pay a visit to another wife of Kamea-Mea.
"The apartment," says the traveller, "was furnished in the European fashion, with chairs, tables, and looking-glasses. In one corner stood an immensely large bed with silk curtains; the floor was covered with fine mats, and on these, in the middle of the room, lay Nomahanna, extended on her stomach, her head turned towards the door, and her arms supported on a silk pillow.... Nomahanna, who appeared at the utmost not more than forty years old, was exactly six feet two inches high, and rather more than two ells in circumference.... Her coal-black hair was neatly plaited, at the top of a head as round as a ball; her flat nose and thick projecting lips were certainly not very handsome, yet was her countenance on the whole prepossessing and agreeable."
The "good lady" remembered having seen Kotzebue ten years before. She, therefore, received him graciously, but she could not speak of her husband without tears in her eyes, and her grief did not appear to be assumed. In order that the date of his death should be ever-present to her mind she had had the inscription 6th May, 1819, branded on her arm.