[Footnote 7: The adoption by their grandparents and hiding away of the twins must be compared with a large number of concealed birth tales in which relatives of superior supernatural power preserve the hero or heroine at birth and train and endow their foster children for a life of adventure. This motive reflects Polynesian custom. Adoption was by no means uncommon among Polynesians, and many a man owed his preservation from death to the fancy of some distant relative who had literally picked him off the rubbish heap to make a pet of. The secret amours of chiefs, too, led, according to Malo (p. 82), to the theme of the high chief's son brought up in disguise, who later proves his rank, a theme as dear to the Polynesian as to romance lovers of other lands.]
CHAPTER II
[Footnote 8: The iako of a canoe are the two arched sticks which hold the outrigger. The kua iako are the points at which they are bound to the canoe, or rest upon it, aft and abaft of the canoe.]
[Footnote 9: The verb hookuiia means literally "cause to be pierced" as with a needle or other sharp instrument. Kui describes the act of piercing, hoo is the causative prefix, ia the passive particle, which was, in old Hawaiian, commonly attached to the verb as a suffix. The Hawaiian speech expresses much more exactly than our own the delicate distinction between the subject in its active and passive relation to an action, hence the passive is vastly more common. Mr. J.S. Emerson points out to me a classic example of the passive used as an imperative—an old form unknown to-day—in the story of the rock, Lekia, the "pohaku o Lekia" which overlooks the famous Green Lake at Kapoho, Puna. Lekia, the demigod, was attacked by the magician, Kaleikini, and when almost overcome, was encouraged by her mother, who called out, "Pohaku o Lekia, onia a paa"—"be planted firm." This the demigod effected so successfully as never again to be shaken from her position.]
[Footnote 10: Hawaiian challenge stories bring out a strongly felt distinction in the Polynesian mind between these two provinces, maloko a mawaho, "inside and outside" of a house. When the boy Kalapana comes to challenge his oppressor he is told to stay outside; inside is for the chief. "Very well," answers the hero, "I choose the outside; anyone who comes out does so at his peril." So he proves that he has the better of the exclusive company.]
[Footnote 11: In his invocation the man recognizes the two classes of Hawaiian society, chiefs and common people, and names certain distinctive ranks. The commoners are the farming class, hu, makaainu, lopakuakea, lopahoopiliwale referring to different grades of tenant farmers. Priests and soothsayers are ranked with chiefs, whose households, aialo, are made up of hangers-on of lower rank—courtiers as distinguished from the low-ranking countrymen—makaaina—who remain on the land. Chiefs of the highest rank, niaupio, claim descent within the single family of a high chief. All high-class chiefs must claim parentage at least of a mother of the highest rank; the low chiefs, kaukaualii, rise to rank through marriage (Malo, p. 82). The ohi are perhaps the wohi, high chiefs who are of the highest rank on the father's side and but a step lower on the mother's.]
[Footnote 12: With this judgment of beauty should be compared Fornander's story of Kepakailiula, where "mother's brothers" search for a woman beautiful enough to wed their protegé, but find a flaw in each candidate; and the episode of the match of beauty in the tale of Kalanimanuia.]
CHAPTER III
[Footnote 13: The building of a heiau, or temple, was a common means of propitiating a deity and winning his help for a cause. Ellis records (1825) that on the journey from Kailua to Kealakekua he passed at least one heiau to every half mile. The classic instance in Hawaiian history is the building of the great temple of Puukohala at Kawaihae by Kamehamaha, in order to propitiate his war god, and the tolling thither of his rival, Keoua, to present as the first victim upon the altar, a treachery which practically concluded the conquest of Hawaii. Malo (p. 210) describes the "days of consecration of the temple.">[
[Footnote 14: The nights of Kane and of Lono follow each other on the 27th and 28th of the month and constitute the days of taboo for the god Kane. Four such taboo seasons occur during the month, each lasting from two to three days and dedicated to the gods Ku, Kanaloa, and Kane, and to Hua at the time of full moon. The night Kukahi names the first night of the taboo for Ku, the highest god of Hawaii.]