"And how did Captain Cook requite this boundless hospitality, that never once made default during his long stay of seventeen days in Kealakeakua, these magnificent presents of immense value, this delicate and spontaneous attention to every want, this friendship of the chiefs and priests, this friendliness of the common people? By imposing on their good nature to the utmost limit of its ability to respond to the greedy and constant calls of their new friends; by shooting at one of the king's officers for endeavoring to enforce a law of the land, an edict of his sovereign that happened to be unpalatable to the new comers, and caused them some temporary inconvenience, after a week's profusion and unbridled license; by a liberal exhibition of his force and the meanest display of his bounty; by giving the king a linen shirt and a cutlass in return for feather cloaks and helmets, which, irrespective of their value as insignia of the highest nobility in the land, were worth, singly at least from five to ten thousand dollars, at present price of the feathers, not counting the cost of manufacturing; by a reckless disregard of the proprieties of ordinary intercourse, even between civilized and savage man, and a wanton insult to what he reasonably may have supposed to have been the religious sentiments of his hosts." This is up to the mark of a criminal lawyer retained to prove by native testimony that Captain James Cook was not murdered, but executed for cause. The great crime of Cook is up to this point that of playing that he was one of the Polynesian gods. Fornander says: "When the sailors carried off, not only the railing of the temple, but also the idols of the gods within it, even the large-hearted patience of Kaoo gave up, and he meekly requested that the central idol at least, might be restored. Captain King failed to perceive that the concession of the priests was that of a devotee to his saint. The priests would not sell their religious emblems and belongings for "thirty pieces of silver," or any remuneration, but they were willing to offer up the entire Heiau, and themselves on the top of it, as a holocaust to Lono, if he had requested it. So long as Cook was regarded as a god in their eyes they could not refuse him. And though they exhibited no resentment at the request, the want of delicacy and consideration on the part of Captain Cook is none the less glaring. After his death, and when the illusion of godship had subsided, his spoliation of the very Heiau in which he had been deified was not one of the least of the grievances which native annalists laid up against him."
Contrast this flagrancy in advocacy of the cause of the barbarous
natives with the last words Cook wrote in his journal. We quote from
"A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean," by Captain James Cook, F.R.S.,
(Vol. II., pages 251-252):
"As it was of the last importance to procure a supply of provisions at these islands; and experience having taught me that I could have no chance to succeed in this, if a free trade with the natives were to be allowed; that is, if it were left to every man's discretion to trade for what he pleased, and in what manner he pleased; for this substantial reason, I now published an order prohibiting all persons from trading, except such as should be appointed by me and Captain Clarke; and even these were enjoined to trade only for provisions and refreshments. Women were also forbidden to be admitted into the ships, except under certain restrictions. But the evil I intended to prevent, by this regulation, I soon found had already got amongst them.
"I stood in again the next morning till within three or four miles of the land, where we were met with a number of canoes laden with provisions. We brought to, and continued trading with the people in them till four in the afternoon, when, having got a pretty good supply, we made sail and stretched off to the northward.
"I had never met with a behavior so free from reserve and suspicion in my intercourse with any tribe of savages as we experienced in the people of this island. It was very common for them to send up into the ship the several articles they brought for barter; afterward, they would come in themselves and make their bargains on the quarter-deck.
"We spent the night as usual, standing off and on. It happened that four men and ten women who had come on board the preceding day still remained with us. As I did not like the company of the latter, I stood in shore toward noon, principally with a view to get them out of the ship; and, some canoes coming off, I took that opportunity of sending away our guests.
"In the evening Mr. Bligh returned and reported that he had found a bay in which was good anchorage, and fresh water in a situation tolerably easy to be come at. Into this bay I resolved to carry the ships, there to refit and supply ourselves with every refreshment that the place could afford. As night approached the greater part of our visitors retired to the shore, but numbers of them requested our permission to sleep on board. Curiosity was not the only motive, at least with some, for the next morning several things were missing, which determined me not to entertain so many another night.
"At eleven o'clock in the forenoon we anchored in the bay, which is called by the natives Karakaooa, (Kealakeakua), in thirteen fathoms water, over a sandy bottom, and about a quarter of a mile from the northeast shore. In this situation the south point of the bay bore south by west, and the north point west half north. We moored with the stream-anchor and cable, to the northward, unbent the sails and struck yards and topmasts. The ships continued to be much crowded with natives, and were surrounded by a multitude of canoes. I had nowhere, in the course of my voyages, seen so numerous a body of people assembled in one place. For, besides those who had come off to us in canoes, all the shore of the bay was covered with spectators, and many hundreds were swimming around the ships like shoals of fish. We could not but be struck with the singularity of this scene, and perhaps there were few on board who lamented our having failed in our endeavors to find a northern passage homeward last summer. To this disappointment we owed our having it in our power to revisit the Sandwich Islands, and to enrich our voyage with a discovery which, though the last, seemed in many respects to be the most important that had hitherto been made by Europeans, throughout the extent of the Pacific Ocean."
This is the end of Cook's writing. His murder followed immediately. He fell by the hands of people for whom his good will was shown in his last words. The concluding pages of the journal answer all the scandals his enemies have so busily circulated.
There is a gleam of humor that shows like a thread of gold in the midst of the somber tragedies of the Sandwich Islands, and we must not omit to extract it from "The Voyage of Discovery Around the World" by Captain George Vancouver, when he spent some time in Hawaii, and gives two bright pictures—one of a theatrical performance, and the other the happy settlement of the disordered domestic relations of a monarch.