Around the world with a king

Front matter

y

in 2011 witii funding from

H

Chapter I

Pack King Kalakaua Plans a Tour — The First Sovereign to Put a Girdle Around the World — Selects His Companions — His Valet — Proposes to Travel Incognito — Scope of His Tour — Delay in Publication of This Memoir — The King Addresses His Subjects — Ceremonies Attending the Departure — The King's Character — His Minister and Chamberlain — Kalakaua's Knowledge of Royal Etiquette — His Unfortunate Predecessors — Theoretical and Practical Astronomy . . i

Chapter II

Arrival in San Francisco — Hoisting the Royal Standard — The King is generously Entertained — Visits the Legislature — "The Colossus of the Pacific" — A Chinese Banquet — The King, Elated, Requires Minister to Wear Diplomatic Uniform — The Valet Gets Drunk . . 14

Chapter III

Departure for Japan — Logs on the Ocean — Washington's Birthday — Losing a Day — Slapping a King in the Face — Attempts to Instruct the King in Political Science — The Conflict of Races in Hawaii — Failure of Educational Effort 20

Chapter IV

The Bay of Yedo — Fusyama — Saluted by Foreign Warships— The King Becomes the Guest of the Japanese Emperor — Lands to the Music of His Own National Anthem— The Secret of Our Reception — Lessons in Etiquette — Japanese and New England Bells ... 27

Chapter V

Visit to the Emperor at Tokio— Reception at the Palaoe — The Empress— A Lady in Waiting — Comparison of the Emperor and the King — Lodged in the Palace of the Enriokwan — Robert the Valet Falls Again— The Royal Feather Cloak — The Emperor Returns the King's Visit — Dinners, Luncheons, and Receptions — An Imperial Prince Always Present with the King— Reflections . ... ;^^

X CONTENTS

Chapter VI

Pack The Shrines of Shiba — Curious Worship — The King's Aphorism — Ihe Japanese I'rcss Discusses the King — Curiosity about his White Attendants — Count Inouye, Minister of Foreign Affairs — Invitation to Prolong the Royal Visit — An Important Diplomatic Event — Proposed Abrogation of an Unjust Treaty between Japan and Hawaii — Dehght of tlic ICmperor and His Government— Drafting a New Treaty — The Great European Powers Disturbed Thereby ... 45

Chapter VII

Entertainments in Our Palace — The King Receives the Representatives of Foreign Nations — Dr. Benjamin Franklin's Japanese Descendants

The King Carefully Guarded — The Position of the Hawaiian

Kingdom in the Pacific — Its Growth— The Japanese Character- - The Sudden Rise of the People and Their Reformations— Review of Japanese Troops — An Earthquake — The Skeleton in Our Military Closet — The Hawaiian Army and Navy — A Japanese Drama — The King Presents a Drop-Curtain to the Theatre — The Hawaiian Minister Visits Count Inouye — His Residence — Strange Adventures of Two Japanese Statesmen 52

Chapter VIII

The King Proposes a Matrimonial Alliance Between the Royal Families of Japan and Hawaii — The Plan Fails — The King Visits the Christian Church in Yokohama — Japanese Views Regarding Christian Missions — Their Political Danger 62

Chapter IX

Lunch with the Imperial Princes — Japanese Women — Hawaiian Use of English — Dinner in Japanese Style at the Noblemen's Club — Japanese Costumes — The Geisha Girls and the Musicians — Visits to the Naval Academy, the Military Barracks, Museums, and Factories— Dinner with the Emperor — Decoration of the King and His Suite — A Like Compliment Paid to the Emperor — Telegram Announcing Assassination of the Tsar of Russia Suppressed — The Grand Hanquet — Reception by the Empress — The Assassination of the Tsar Announced, and the King Leaves — A Great Ball Postponed— The Court in Mourning — The Emperor Dines with the King in the Enriokwan, and Takes Leave of Him — Presents from the Emperor 67

CONTENTS xi

Chapter X

Page Departure for Yokohama, Kobe, and Nagasaki — The Emperor sends Imperial Commissioners with His Guest — Japanese Evolution — Kobe, and the Old Capital of Kioto — Mistakes about the King's Identity — Visit to Osaka — Attempt to Dine Incognito at Japanese Inn — The Disguise Penetrated — Visit to an Old Missionary in Kobe — The Inland Sea— Salutes — The King's Reflections — Favours Buddhism — At Nagasaki — Japanese Navigation — Promiscuous Bathing — Imperial Commissioners Leave at the Boundary of the Empire — Chinese and Japanese Morality — The Steamer Coaled by Women and Children 79

Chapter XI

The Yellow Sea — The King Wishes to See the Emperor of China — Decided to be Impracticable — Shanghai — Received by the Taotai — An American Negro in China — A Large Steamer Placed at the King's Service — The Boy and the " Cannibal King" — Departure for Tientsin — Danger from Pirates — The Peiho River and the Taku Forts — "Blood is Thicker than Water" — Received at Tientsin by the Taotai and Viceroy Li Hung Chang's Secretary — Difficulties About Visiting Pekin— The King Only a Foreign Devil — CalHng on the Viceroy — Li Asks Questions and Smokes — The Viceroy Returns the King's Call and Asks More Questions — His Opinion About the Japanese— People Gather to See the "Black Foreign Devil" — Dinner with the Viceroy — The Viceroy's Son — Chinese Democracy — Presents from the Viceroy 88

Chapter XII

Return to Shanghai — Cordial Receptions — Chinese After-Dinner Customs— Sail for Hongkong — Chinese Superstitions — The Missionary Misunderstands Them 100

Chapter XIII

At Hongkong — The King Becomes Queen Victoria's Guest at Government House — Conversations with the Governor — Saluted by Forts and Warships — Official Announcement in English and Chinese — A Tramp Steamer Direct to Siam — Colonel Mosby, American Consul — Banquets and Other Entertainments — Captain Cook's Indiscretion — Reception to Chinese Merchants — Importance of Hongkong — British Rule — The King's Nap at the Banquet — A Lady's Strategy — Chinese Absorption of Christianity 104

Page xii CONTENTS

Chapter XIV

We Sail on the "Killarney" for Siam — The Irish Captain and the German Valet— Cochin-China— The Captain Disturbs the King with Stories of Piracy — Enter Gulf of Siam — Received at Mouth of Menan River by Siamese Officials — Reach Bangkok in the Royal Yacht— The Royal Barge — Our Reception — Siamese Attendants — "The Wine of the Coral Reef" "4

Chapter XV

Pagodas — A Floating City and an Amphibious Population — Darwin Mistaken — Visit to the King of Siam — The King's Conversation — Cats Disturb the Reception — Call on Second King, and on Uncle of Siamese King — Dinner with the Minister of Foreign Affairs — Drowning of a Queen and Child — Sacredness of the Royal Person — A Costly Cremation — The Royal Chapel— Visits from the Siamese King, the Second King, Princes, and Consular Corps — The Royal Elephants — A Play in a Court Theatre — Siamese Dancers Sing a Missionary Hymn — Dinner with the Siamese King — Conferring of Decorations — The Durien — Kings Say Good-Bye — Buddhist Rites to Protect Steamer — The Chinese in Siam — Siamese Statesmen do Not Understand Christendom — Presents of Fruit 123

Chapter XVI

Arrival at Singapore — The King Tired of Royal Etiquette — Visits and Receives the Governor — Drive over the Island — Importance of the Place — A Colossal Missionary Station— The King and the Tiger — A State Banquet — Effect of the "Climate" on Englishmen in the Tropics — Visit to the Maharajah of Jobore — His Grand Palace — The Sword of State and the Great Umbrella — The Valet and the Feathered Cloak — Tiffin with the Maharajah — The Sovereigns Discover Each Other's " Strawberry -Marks " — A State Banquet — Dreams of Residence in Marble Halls — Moonlight and Native Music — A Morning Scene — Farewell to Singapore — More Trouble for the Valet — Loss of the Feather Cloak — Embarkation for Calcutta . . 136

Chapter XVII

Brief Visit to Malacca — Reception at Penang by the Lieutenant- Governor — A Rich Chinaman's House — A Nautch Dancer's Performance— Hindu Caste — Maulmain — Elephants in the Lumber Yards — Animal Intelligence — A Burmese Wedding — Rangoon — Buddhist Pagodas— Women's Emancipation in Burmah — The

CONTENTS xiii

Page Queen's Birthday in the East — The British Power Everywhere — A Mohammedan at His Prayers — Entering the Hooghly — " Ganga ! Ganga!" H9

Chapter XVIII

deception at Calcutta — The Enghsh Civil Service— The Secret of Britain's Power in India — The American Negro Problem Compared with Race Problems in the East— The Reign of the "Plug" Hat — An Ex- King of Oude — Circumventing the King — Babu Literature

— Robert Again Seeks to Rise to His Hereditary Level — Leave Calcutta for Bombay —Cooling the Train— Desolation of the Country— Need of Irrigation — An Indian Statesman's Views on European Civilisation — The King Creates a New Order of Merit — The Sacred City of Benares — Visit the Temples and the River — The Monkey Temple and the Imperturbable Goat — Priestly Logic — Reception at Bombay — Parsees — The Towers of Silence — Sir Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy's Magnificent Residence 15^

Chapter XIX

i^'rom Bombay to Suez — Some Modest British Heroes — Anecdotes of the Candahar Campaign — The Valet's Relations to the King Explained— Aden — No Trace of the Lost Lenore — Black Arab Boys with Red Hair — Diving for Coins ; an Old Trick of the King and His Suite — Mount Sinai — An Englishman's Comments on its Possessors — Surprised by the Khedive's Officers at Suez —The King Invited to Be the Khedive's Guest — The Suez Canal — " Sandwiches " at Zigazag

— Mohammedan Abstinence — Mussulman Comments on Christianity 170

Chapter XX

!airo — General Stone — The Pyramids — In the Khedive's Palace — Egyptian Donkeys — Drive through the Streets of Cairo — The Mas- ' sacre of the Mamelukes — The Museum and Its Curator — Received at Alexandria by the Khedive — Palace "Number Three" — The Harem — Mohammedan Views of Woman's Position — The King Returns the Khedive's Visit — Jewelled Pipes and Coffee-Cups — The Khedive's Views on Polygamy — Egypt under the Lion's Paw — The King's Belief in His Divine Origin — Dinner with the Khedive — Political Unrest — Polygamy a Divine Institution — Leprosy — The Khedive's Stables — Ball at the Palace of the Ras-el-Tin —Captain Cook's Old Frigate, the "Resolution" — A Greek Beauty — Historic Ground : Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Mark Antony, and Cleopatra — Departure for Italy — The Vice-Regal Barge . . . . i8i xiv CONTENTS

Chapter XXI

Page Comments of Egyptian Press — The King's Masonic Rank — Voyage to

Naples — A Comet — Catalonia — Volcanoes of Hawaii and Sicily —

Divine Stoppage of Lava- Flows — An Italian Adventurer in Honolulu

— He Reappears at Naples and Abducts the King — Pursuit and Recapture of His Majesty — Visit to the King and Queen of Italy — The Adventurer Dismissed — Italian Poems of Adulation to Strangers

— Ex-Khedive Ismail Calls — Troubles with Hotel-Keepers Begin — News of Attack on President Garfield 196

Chapter XXII

Rome — Cardinal Jacobini — Interview with the Holy Father — Pleasant Conversation — Cardinal Howard — A Picturesque Scene — The King Prevented by his Suite from Visiting St. Petersburg — Leave for England via Paris — A Scheming Hollander — Ride through Paris and Leave for London — Violation of French Etiquette .... 207

Chapter XXIII

London, Claridge's Hotel — Royal and Ministerial Callers — The Duke of Edinburgh's Visit to Hawaii — The Prince of Wales Makes a Social "Lion" of the King — The Royal Family Takes the King up Without Reserve — The Queen's Carriages at His Service — Patti at the Royal Italian Opera— An Old Schoolmate, General Armstrong — The Houses of Parliament — The " Plug" Hat the Symbol of British Power — Volunteer Review in Windsor Park — The Crown Prince of Germany — Novelty of Our Situation — Westminster Abbey — A Trip on the River with Lord Charles Beresford 214

Chapter XXIV

Luncheon at Earl Granville's with Mr. Gladstone and Members of the Cabinet— Visit to the Queen at Windsor Castle — Her Majesty Inquires for Queen Emma — Luncheon at the Castle — Visit from the Crown Prince of Germany — Call at Marlborough House — The Prince and Princess of Wales — Lunch with the Prince at Lord Charles Beresford's — American Women — Lord Beresford's Escapade in Hawaii — The Prince of Wales's Visit to the United States — Garden Party at Marlborough House — The Queen Present — Mr. Lowell, the American Minister — An Informal Gathering of Royalty and Its Friends — The King Approved of — Lambeth Palace and the Archbishop of Canterbury — Reception to Prince and Princess of Wales at Kensington Museum — Earl Spencer's Mistake — A Royal Procession — Aristocratic Life a Bore , 223

CONTENTS XV

CHAPTER XXV Page

lall at Hyde Park Barracks — Grand Decorations — The Prince of

Wales, as Colonel of the Second Life Guards, Receives the Guests —

Colonial Banquet at Guildhall — Builders of the British Empire —

The Prince and King Make Speeches — The King Offends the Irish

— The Consequences — Entertained by Lord Brassey at Normalhurst

— Lunch with Prince of Wales at Sir Christopher Sykes's — Dinner at Tnnity House — General Grant's Mistake — Places of Interest — Handsome Jewish Women — Dinner with Baroness Burdett-Coutts

— The King Decorated — He also Decorates the Queen and Prince of Wales — " Punch " and the King — Ball at Marlborough House — Lunch with the Duke and Duchess of Teck — The "Lion" Leaves England — The King and the British Government 234

Chapter XXVI

Belgium — Consular Oflfices — The Battlefield of Waterloo — Civilised and Pagan Warfare — Visits from and to King Leopold — Berlin — Visit to Prince William and Other Princes in Pottsdam — Dines with Prince William — Mihtary Reviews — The Skeleton Dances — The Royal Hawaiian Band — Dinner with the Red Prince — Krupp's Gun Factory 248

Chapter XXVII

''ienna — The Royal Family Represented by Archduke Albrecht — Mr. Phelps, the American Minister, and Mr. Schuyler, the United States Consul-General — A Yale Jubilee — The King Reviews Austrian Troops — Proposed Guarantee of Hawaiian Independence — The King Enjoys Himself on the Prater — Reporters — Paris — No Reception by the French Government — Unravelling the Mystery — Our Bad Manners — Question of Declaring War Against France — Reconciliation— An Incident of the Commune — Minister St. Hilaire Calls

— Requests for Decorations — Count de Lesseps — The Ballet Girls

at the Opera 255

Chapter XXVIII

it the Spanish Frontier — The Escurial — Reception at Madrid — Our Car Derailed by a Cow — Portugal — The Royal Car — Received by the King and Queen— The Little Skeleton Again — Mutual Decorations— Dom Fernando — Portuguese in Hawaii — Cintra — Pena — A Magnificent Outlook — Dinner with the Portuguese King — A Narrow Escape for Vasco da Gama as Told by His Descendant — A xvi CONTENTS

Bull-Fight — Good-Bye to Portugal — The Monarchs Embrace — Negotiating a Treaty — The King Starts for Home via Spain, France, England, Scotland, and the United States — The Valet's Estimate of His Position 264

Chapter XXIX

New York, Philadelphia, and Washington — On the Cobble-stones of Democracy — The King Presented to President Arthur— Fortress Monroe and Hampton Normal School — The King Buys Horses in Kentucky — Banquet in San Francisco — Saihngfor Home — Casting Up Accounts — What Wisdom Has His Majesty "Sucked" — He Agrees with Learned Men — Reception at Honolulu — The Girdle Around the Earth is Clasped 274

Chapter XXX

The End of the Monarchy — The King and His Divine Origin and Mission— Insists on Coronation — Ministers Resign — The King Resists Parliamentary Government — Confronted with the Bayonet and Yields

— He Instigates Revolution, but Fails — Visits California and Dies

— Liliuokalani His Successor — She Attempts to Make a New Constitution, and the Monarchy is Overthrown — Annexation to the United States— The Work of the Missionaries 283

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Kalakaua, King of the Hawaiian Islands . . . Frontispiece

Colonel C. H. Judd, King Kalakaua's Chamberlain Facing page 2

Li Hung Chang (188 1 ) " " 94

Menu of Dinner given in honour of King

Kalakaua, by Li Hung Chang .... " " 98

Extract from Hongkong Newspaper ... '^ "106

Invitation to dine with the King of Siam . . " "130

The Maharajah of J ohore (188 1 ) .... " " 140

The Viceroy of Egypt (188 1 ) " "190

Humberto, King of Italy (1881) .... " " 198

Margherita, Queen of Italy (188 1 ) ... " " 200

The Crown Prince of Italy (1881) ... " " 204

The Duke of Edinburgh (1881) .... '' " 214

The Prince of Wales (188 1 ) " "216

The Prince Imperial of Germany (188 1 ) . " " 220

The Princess of Prussia (188 1) " " 222

Queen Victoria and the Princess Beatrice

(1881) " "224

Prince Henry of Prussia (i88i) .... " " 226

The Princess of Wales (188 1 ) " "228 xviii ILLUSTRATIONS

The King of Belgium ( 1 88 1 ) .... Faci7igpage 2\Z

The Queen of Belgium (1881) " " 250

Prince William of Prussia and Princess

(1881) " "252

Franz Joseph I, Emperor of Austria (188 1) " " 254

Elisabeth, Empress of Austria (i 881) . . . " "256

President Gr^vy of France (188 1). ... " " 258

The Queen of Spain (188 1 ) " "264

Dom Fernando, Regent of Portugal (1881) " " 266

The King of Portugal (188 1) " "268

The Queen of Portugal (1881) " *' 272

William N. Armstrong, after a Dinner given

by King Kalakaua " "280

King Kalakaua and his Military Staff. {On

the Steps of his Falace, 1882) .... " "284

AROUND THE WORLD WITH A KING

Chapter I

King Kalakaua Plans a Tour — The First Sovereign to Put a Girdle Around the World — Selects His Companions — His Valet — Proposes to Travel Incognito — Scope of His Tour — Delay in Publication of This Memoir — The King Addresses His Subjects — Ceremonies Attending the Departure — The King's Character — His Minister and Chamberlain — Kalakaua's Knowledge of Royal Etiquette — His Unfortunate Predecessors — Theoretical and Practical Astronomy.

KALAKAUA I, King of the Hawaiian Islands, said to me, his Attorney-General, early one morning in January, 1881, while we sat under the cocoanut palms which towered above his little Summer Palace at Waikiki, near Honolulu, and the surf of the Pacific Ocean, foaming over the coral reef, broke nearly at our feet, —

" Now that my troubles are over, I mean to take a trip around the world, and you must go with me."

He had been upon the throne for six years, and, with the true instincts of sovereigns, had availed himself of several opportunities to engage in difficulties with some of his white subjects, who held the brains and most of the property of the kingdom. They had lately threatened insurrection because he had committed several serious political errors, but he had yielded to their demands, and on the night preceding this declaration of intention to travel he and a hundred of his white subjects had met in a grand banquet; they had together emptied the loving cup; and the white doves of peace again swept through the tropic air.

I took his remark as an idle fancy which would quickly be replaced by other similar ones. But as we rode into the city I said:

" If your Majesty makes a tour of the world, you will be the first sovereign of the earth who has ever travelled around it, and your subjects should erect a high monument of lava stones on the crown of Punch BowP with this inscription upon it:

" To THE First Sovereign

Who Put a Girdle Around the Earth.

Since the concert of the morning stars, or the appearance of man on the globe, sovereigns have done many great and many small things; but not one of them, even in these later days, has had the audacity or pluck to circumnavigate this little planet. Like certain sagacious animals which never travel far from their holes in the earth through fear of being dispossessed of them by an enemy, rulers seldom stray far from their thrones lest rivals seize and occupy them. Besides, there are the perils of land and sea. Sir John Mandeville, that great traveller, said in 1356: "Although it be possible to go round the world, yet of a thousand persons not one might happen to return to his country." The sov-

1 An extinct volcano rising behind the city.

Colonel C. H. Judd, King Kalakaua's Chamberlain.

ereigns before his time anticipated his forecast, and those who came after him observed his cautions and the wisdom of the brute creation and left to a Polynesian king the honour, if there be any, of achieving this deed.

Before night I discovered that his Majesty was in a serious mood, for he convened his Cabinet, of which I was a member, declared his intention to make the journey, and requested a meeting of his Privy Council, at which the necessary funds could be provided. The Cabinet and the Council approved of the project and were willing to provide abundantly for it. He declared also that he should take with him, as companion, the author of this memoir, who would receive the commission of " Minister of State," which would place him in the same rank as the Cabinet Ministers of any sovereign, and entitle him to the respect and courtesies due that rank, while, in order to give the appearance of a useful purpose to the royal expedition, he made him also, " Royal Commissioner of Immigration," with instructions to seek over the world recruits to the depleted population of the kingdom, a depletion so steadily growing that there was imminent danger, within a few generations, of the singular case of a native monarchy without a native subject. In addition to the Minister of State he selected Colonel C. H. Judd, his Chamberlain, and one of his most trustworthy friends, as his second companion. His personal attendant, or valet, was a German known as '^ Robert," an educated man of prepossessing appearance and a remarkable linguist. Owing to his intemperate habits he never remained long in any situation. He had served as cook on sailing-vessels, and on landing in Hawaii had become the King's chef. But his unreliabiHty had cast him out of this situation. There was a

rumour that he was the Baron von O . This

was verified by the suite during the tour. In spite of his habits, the King, for reasons which I did not then know, consented to engage him as valet upon a new pledge of sobriety; but the engagement was made under the mild protest of the suite.

Before recording the incidents of this royal tour it may be said, in anticipation, that the King of Hawaii executed his mission as a circumnavigator within the ten following months, during which time he became the guest of, or was received in state ceremonies by, the Emperor of Japan ; General Li Hung Chang, of China; the Governor of Hongkong, in the name of the British Queen; the King of Siam; the British Governors or Commissioners of Singapore, Penang, the Malacca Straits, and of Burmah; the Vice-Regal Court of India; the Viceroy of Egypt ; the King of Italy ; the Holy Father in Rome ; .the British Queen ; the King of Belgium ; the Court of Emperor William of Germany ; the officials of the Austrian Empire, in the absence of the Emperor; the officials of the French Republic; the officials of the Spanish Court, whose Regent was absent; the King of Portugal; and finally, the President of the United States, from which country he returned to his own kingdom.

The memoir of the incidents of this tour were noted from day to day by the writer, his " Minister of State" and companion; but its publication has been delayed for some years, and until after his death, in order to permit a freedom of narration, an adherence to truth, and " the painting of a portrait with the wrinkles ; " nor has it been found necessary to follow Macaulay's aphorism, that ^^ the best portraits are those in which there is a slight admixture of caricature." Kings, above all men, resent any language but that of adulation, and if one would avoid censure he is wise to await the co-operation of Death, and reserve his narrative until the subject of it is in the other world, where, according to Lord Bacon, Menippus, in his travels through hell, found the kings of the earth distinguished from other men chiefly by their louder wailings and tears.

Before the King began his tour I incidentally called his attention to certain omens which might disturb his Polynesian and somewhat superstitious mind.

One of his predecessors, Kamehameha II, King of the Sandwich Islands, as they were called in the early days, and his spouse Kamamalu, in the year 1824, while the people were pagans, visited England as guests of the British monarch. Both of them died of the measles, in London, and their bodies were conveyed with royal honours to their kingdom in the British frigate " Blonde," commanded by Lord Byron, a cousin of the poet. Their sudden and nearly simultaneous deaths were reported to Theodore Hook, giving the wit the opportunity for his well-known couplet, announcing the sad event:

" * Waiter ! two sandwiches ! ' cried Death ; And their wild Majesties resigned their breath."

At the moment when their successor, nearly sixty years later, proposed to travel in foreign countries, the small-pox broke out in his own capital, with much loss of life. He wisely concluded to let the monster gratify his insatiate appetite on common Sandwiches, while he removed himself, as material for a royal Sandwich, out of the kingdom.

In order to prevent a large retinue of his loyal native and white subjects from following him in his tour, at his own great expense, he announced that he would travel incognito under the title of Prince. His sister, the Princess Liliuokalani, now the ex-Queen of Hawaii, was by royal proclamation designated as Regent during his absence.

Several days before his departure he invited his native subjects to meet him in the largest church of his capital, and although he had not, during the six years of his reign, taken any special interest in the welfare of his people, he announced to them from the platform that his chief object in travel was to avail himself of the experience of other nations for their benefit. This paternal solicitude greatly pleased his native subjects, who had fallen far behind their white neighbours in the march of progress, because, as one of the King's predecessors had frankly said, they were " shiftless, lazy, and incompetent." The King's declaration led them to believe that he would return laden with patent and miraculous contrivances which would give them abundance without labour, and enable them to scratch themselves with tropical serenity, which was the habit of their inheritance, and they cordially approved of this royal act of selfsacrifice. The Protestant missionaries had brought to them the blessings of civilisation, but the seafaring countrymen of the missionaries had also brought to them its curses, and it was an act of kingly philanthropy for their sovereign to seek in foreign lands some method of relief, if there was any, from their unfortunate sufferings between the upper and nether millstones of Christian civilisation.

When the day arrived on which the steamer from xA.ustralia, bound to San Francisco, was due, the natives loyally gathered at the Palace, to fulfil those rites and ceremonies which were fitting on such an unusual event as the departure of the King from his country, and groups of singers and dancers gathered on the thick sward under the royal palms. Each dancer had a gourd filled with pebbles, and shook it, in measured time, with one hand, while with the other he described graceful motions in the air. Wreaths of sweet-scented vines and many-coloured flowers encircled or streamed from their bodies, or were entwined with their glossy black locks. No jewelled necklace or spangled dress of the European ballet rival these natural ornaments from the flowerbearing valleys. The singers, squatting in groups, dressed in the glory of the fields, told the story, in a plaintive minor key, of the greatness of the Hawaiian kings, their miraculous exploits, and their imperishable renown. Many of the words of the songs were in the ancient language and were understood only by the older people; but if translated they would have promoted intense activity in a Society for the Promotion of Moral Literature, if one had existed there. As one group of singers and dancers became exhausted, relays of new performers replaced them, in order that there might be no gap in movement or melody.

The steamer did not arrive on time, but traditional etiquette required that these ceremonies should continue unbroken until the King embarked. Many hours passed, and there was no end to the dancing or singing, and at midnight the trade winds died away and the moon arose. In the dreamy stilhiess of the soft air the low monotonous chanting, the measured rattling of the gourds, rose above the trees, with intervals of European music by the military band. I was on a high balcony overlooking this strange scene, with its extraordinary mixture of the airs of Polynesia and of Europe. Beyond the forest of tall cocoanut palms I heard the surf of the Pacific Ocean, with " great white avalanches of thunder," rolling up on the coral beach. This music of intermingled paganism, civilisation, and ocean ended only with the dawn, and with the dawn the steamer arrived, and the King promptly embarked. Some ancient cannon of large calibre, situated on the height above the city, discharged a royal salute of twenty-one guns, and the King and his suite stood on the deck, buried in a wilderness of flowers ; for it is the agreeable custom of the country to decorate departing friends with wreaths of flowers and scented vines, and their quantity on this occasion was sufficient to have dressed the masts, yards and rigging of the steamer from stem to stern. Every native had brought a tribute of these, and their perfume filled the air. As the " City of Sydney " swung away from the dock, the national band played " Auld Lang Syne," and "Hawaii Ponoi " (po-no-ee), the national anthem; and the wailing of the natives followed her to the mouth of the harbour until their piercing cries were lost in the roar of the surf.