Under Hawaiian skies, a narrative of the romance, adventure and history of the Hawaiian Islands, a complete historical account, by Albert Pierce Taylor.

10

UNDER HAWAIIAN SKIES

insular dwellers isolated and not previously in contact with another race. The civilization attained by the Hawaiians compares
favorably with that prevalent in Europe, even at the time of the
Dark Ages.
The kings of the various islands were autocratic. They held
the power of life and death over their subjects. The priests
swayed a remarkable, though often stern and sinister, influence.
Violations of the system of living which they imposed upon the
people called for the death penalty. Women, while acquiring a
high place in the nation, were proscribed in their daily life by
the rule of the fearful tabu, yet women have always played important roles in the group.
But the administration of government, the habits of the rulers,
and the customs prevailing at their courts, even the cut of the
garments for royalty, chiefs and commoners, and the manner of
living, was comparable to that current in civilized countries.
Spanish navigators are said to have been wrecked upon the
shores of Hawaii island in the sixteenth century, and the impress
of their race is believed by many Hawaiians of today to have
been made upon the islanders. The ancient Hawaiian helmets
and cloaks were of beautiful designs, fashioned principally from
the feathers of small birds, so beautiful as to command admiration
today, and were also strangely like those of the ancient Greeks
and Phoenicians, many historians claiming to trace a Spanish influence. The ceremony of eating was far superior to that prevailing in the baronial halls of medieval Europe, where gluttony
and the niceties in the partaking of food were in contrast to the
delicacy of method prevailing at the fern-covered tables of the
chiefs laid out in the open under Hawaiian skies. Trunks of
trees fashioned into bowls and beautifully polished, and other
bowls of varying sizes and designs, adorned the tables. There
were large round bowls for poi, the national dish; long, concave
trenchers for roasted pig; wide, flat ones for fish; small calabashes
and gourds for relishes and desserts; large ones filled with water
with fern leaves floating upon the surface for use as finger bowls
-all providing the Hawaiians of ancient periods with dishes