Hawaii (70 page)

"At the same time, however, the visitor from Hawaii to Tahiti is visibly struck by the changes that occurred when Polynesians from the latter islands journeyed north. In Hawaii their stature increased. Their skin became tighter. Their speech became sharper. Their tools underwent obvious changes, and of course their gods were transmuted. Most spectacular was the transformation of the bold, angular and oftentimes lascivious Tahitian hula into the languorous, poetic dance of Hawaii. Change occurred in all things: religon changed from wild vitality to stately formalism; government became stable and self-perpetuating; and what in Tahiti was merely ornamental featherwork became in Hawaii a subtle art of rare beauty. Thus the development of Tahiti's god of the sea, Ta'aroa, into Hawaii's god of hell, Kanaloa, becomes a change in both orthography and theology, but the latter is the greater.

"In our studies of Polynesia we should start from this premise: Nothing that came to Hawaii remained unchanged; flowers, processes, words and men there found new life and new directions. But we must not be deceived by outward appearances, and especially not by word forms, into estimating the differences to be greater than they actually are. Scratch a Hawaiian, and you find a Tahitian."

Abner's avocation was the Seamen's Chapel, where he would often sit for hours with Chaplain Cridland, the sailor whom he himself had brought to God, and he thought: "Of all things I have accomplished, that accidental conversion of Cridland has borne the most fruit." He felt that no life was more difficult or more fraught with temptation than that of sailors, and he was happy that he had been instrumental in erasing Lahaina's brothels and grog shops.

He existed on a pittance sent by the mission board, for he was no longer a full-fledged missionary, but Dr. Whipple kept close watch upon him, and if he required pocket money, either Janders or Whipple saw to it that he got a little. Once, a visitor, seeing the lonely grass shack, adorned only with the portraits of his children, asked compassionately, "Have you no friends?" And Abner replied, "I have known God, and Jerusha Bromley, and Malama Kanakoa, and beyond that a man requires no friends."

Then, in 1849, exhilarating news reached Lahaina and transformed Abner Hale into a spry, excited father, for Reverend Micah Hale wrote from Connecticut that he had decided to leave New England �it was too cold for his taste�and to live permanently in Hawaii, "for I must see once more the palm trees of my youth and the whales playing in Lahaina Roads." Many mission children, after their years at Yale, wrote the heartening news that they were coming

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home, for the islands generated a persuasive charm that could exert itself across thousands of miles, but what qualified Micah's letter as unusual was the fact that he was determined to cross overland to California, for he wanted to see America, and he predicted that sometime near the end of 1849, he would be boarding a ship out of San Francisco.

Consequently, Abner found a map of North America and hung it on the grass wall, marking "it each day with his son's imaginary progress across the vast continent, and from deductions that were remarkably accurate, he announced one day to the crowd in the J & W store in late November of 1849, "My son, the Reverend Micah Hale, is probably arriving in San Francisco right now."

When Micah climbed down out of the Sierra Nevadas and started along the Sacrarnento to the booming San Francisco of the gold rush, he was a handsome, tall young man of twenty-seven, with dark eyes and brown hair like his mother and the quick intelligence of his father. The sallowness and delicate stature of his youth had been transmuted into an attractive bronze, and his chest had filled out from his long hike in the company of gold-seekers crossing the continent. He stepped forward eagerly, as if anticipating excitement at the next tree, and he had won the respect of his fellow travelers by preaching a simple Christianity characterized by God's abiding love for his children, and the respect of the muleteers by nipping straight whiskey when the nights were cold.

In wild and vigorous San Francisco he made acquaintance with many adventurers who had come from Hawaii to the gold fields and was asked to preach in one of the local churches, where after a brief reading of the Bible he captivated his audience by predicting that one day "America will sweep in a chain of settled towns from Boston to San Francisco, and will then move on to Hawaii, to which the American democracy must inevitably be extended. Then San Francisco and Honolulu will be bound together by bonds of love and self-interest, each advancing the work of the Lord."

"Do you consider the Americanization of Hawaii assured?" a San Francisco businessman probed, after the sermon.

"Absolutely inevitable," Micah Hale replied, reflecting his father's love of prophecy. Then, grasping the man's hands in his own, he said forcefully, "My friend, that a Christian America should extend its interests and protection to those heavenly islands is ordained by our destiny. We cannot escape it, even if we would."

"When you use the word we," the businessman asked, "are you speaking as a citizen of Hawaii or as an American?"

"I'm an American!" Micah replied in astonishment. "What else could I be?"

"Reverend," the Californian said impulsively, "you're alone in the town and I'd esteem it a signal honor if you'd have dinner with me.

I have a businessman from Honolulu visiting me, and he used to be an American. Now he's a citzen of the islands."

"I'd like to meet him," Micah agreed, and he drove with his new friend through the excitement of the city to a point overlooking the bay. There they left their team and climbed a steep hill on foot until they reached a prominence which commanded a scene of far-stretching beauty.

"My empire," the man said expansively. "It's like looking out on creationl" He led the young minister inside and introduced him to a tall, powerfully built man with eyes set wide apart and a wealth of black hair that grew long at the ears. "This is Captain Rafer Hoxworth," the Californian said.

Micah, who had never before seen his father's enemy, drew back in loathing. Hoxworth saw this and was challenged by the fact that the young man might insult him by refusing to shake hands. Accordingly, he activated his considerable charm, stepped forward and extended his huge hand, smiling compassionately as he did so. "Aren't you Reverend Kale's son?" he asked in an extra deep, friendly voice. � "I am," Micah said guardedly.

"You look very much like your mother," Hoxworth reflected, as he held onto the minister's hand. "She was a beautiful woman."

Repelled by the sea captain of whom he had heard so many ugly reports, yet fascinated by the man's calculated vitality, Micah asked, "Where did you know my mother?"

"In Walpole, New Hampshire," Hoxworth replied, releasing Micah's hand, but holding him at attention with his dynamic eyes. "Have you ever been to Walpole?" And he launched into a rhapsody on that fairest of villages, and as he spoke he could see that he was whittling away at Micah Hale's resolve, and then with a sense of animal delight he saw that the young man was not listening to him but was looking over his shoulder at someone who had entered the room, and instinctively he wanted the young man to become fascinated, involved, hurt.

In fact, Micah was staring at two people who stood inside the doorway. The first was Noelani Kanakoa Hoxworth, whom he had last seen in his father's church at Lahaina, and if she had been beautiful in those days, she was now radiant, in a dress of jet-black velvet, her hair piled high and as shimmering as a polished kukui nut, and wearing about her slim brown neck a single gold chain from which dangled a glistening whale's-tooth hook. Micah hurried over, grasped her hand and said, "Noelani, Alii Nui, I am so pleased to see you." The tall woman, who now knew Hong Kong and Singapore as well she had once known Lahaina, bowed graciously.

But it was not really Noelani that Micah had rushed to greet, for behind Mrs. Hoxworth stood the most beautiful girl Micah had ever seen. She was as tall as he, very slender, with wide shoulders and tapered hips over which a tight-waisted gown of many gores was fitted. She wore her dark hair piled on her vivacious head, and her complexion was set off thereby, for it was absolutely smooth and of a brownish-olive cast. Her eyes were unusually sparkling and her lips showed white and even teeth. At her ear she wore a large California

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flower, and when her father said, "Join us, Malama. This is Reverend Hale, from Lahaina," she moved gracefully into the room, bowed slightly, and extended her hand in the American manner.

"Meet my daughter, Malama," Captain Hoxworth said, and he was grimly pleased to mark her effect upon the young minister.

That dinner was the most exciting in which Micah had so for participated, surpassing even those held at Yale when the president of the college conversed brilliantly with his students, for Captain Hoxworth spoke of China; the Californian told of his trip southward to Monterey; and Mrs. Hoxworth, unlike the disciplined women who had often eaten with Reverend Hale in New England, was effusive in her recollections of storms at sea and the adventures one could experience in ports like Bangkok and Batavia.

"Do your ships go everywhere in the Pacific?" Micah asked.

"Wherever there's money," Hoxworth replied bluntly.

"Have you ever sailed with your parents?" Micah asked the girl at his side.

"This is my first trip," Malama replied. "Up to now I've been at the Oahu Charity School in Honolulu."

"Are you liking San Francisco?" Micah continued.

"It's much more vigorous than Hawaii," she replied. "But I miss the sunny rainstorms at home. A visitor from Philadelphia came to Honolulu not 'ong ago and asked how to get to J & W's, and he was told, 'Go down to the first shower and turn left.' " The dining companions applauded the story, and young Malama blushed prettily, but what everyone waited to hear was Micah's account of crossing the prairies, and under the excitement of Malama's obvious interest in him, he expanded on his theme in a manner he had not intended.

"The land reaches for a thousand miles in all directions, a waving, wonderful sea of possibilities," he exclaimed "I dug into it a dozen times, and it was rich, dark soil. A hundred thousand people could live there. A million, and they would be lost in its immensity."

"Tell us what you said about the movement of America to San Francisco and on to the islands," the Californian suggested, and at this, Rafer Hoxworth leaned forward and chewed on his expensive Manila cigar.

"I can see the day," Micah expounded, "when there will be wide and well-traveled roads connecting Boston and this town. People will occupy the lands I saw, and enormous wealth will be created. Schools, colleges, churches will flourish. Yale College couldn't begin to accommodate the millions . . ." He was prophesying, like Ezekiel. "What was your idea about Hawaii?" Captain Hoxworth interrupted impatiently.

"When that takes place, Captain, there will be a natural impulse for America to leap out across the Pacific and embrace Hawaii. It will happen! It's got to happen!"

"Do you mean that America will go to war against the Hawaiian monarchy?" Hoxworth pursued, edging his hands forward on the table.

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"No! Never!" Micah cried, intoxicated by his own visions. "America will never employ arms to extend its empire. If this excitement over gold continues to crowd California with people, and if Hawaii flourishes, as it must one day, the two groups of people will naturally see that their interests . . ." He stopped in some embarrassment, for he sensed that whereas Captain Hoxworth agreed with what he was expostulating, Mrs. Hoxworth did not, and he said, "I beg your pardon, ma'am. I'm afraid I presumed when I explained what the Hawaiians will think at that moment."

To his relief, Noelani replied, "There is no need to apologize, Micah." Then she added, "It's clear that Hawaii must one day fall prey to America, for we are small and weak."

"Ma'am," Micah assured her with explosive confidence, "the people of America will not tolerate bloodshed."

Quietly, Noelani reported, "We have been assured that there will shortly be bloodshed within your own country . . . over slavery."

"War? In America?" the young minister replied. "Never! And there will never be war with Hawaii, either. It is equally impossible."

"Young man," Captain Hoxworth interrupted on the spur of the moment, "my ship is departing for Honolulu in the morning. I'd be proud to have you accompany us." Then he added the explanation calculated to inspire the heart of any minister: "As my guest."

Micah, who instinctively knew that he should have no intercourse with this family enemy, hesitated, but at that moment, to Captain Hoxworth's sardonic satisfaction and to Micah's confusion, Malama placed her hand on his and cried, "Please join us!"

Micah blushed and stammered, "I had planned to visit San Francisco for some days."

"We won't wait!" Hoxworth boomed, in his calculated impression of a robust older friend. "We're making so much money running food from Lahaina to the gold fields that a day lost is a fortune foundered."

"You can see San Francisco later," Malama said winsomely, and when Micah looked into her deep Polynesian eyes he felt logic pass into confusion, so that even though he had hiked three thousand miles to see the phenomenon of the west he said weakly, "I'll move my things aboard . . . even though it is the Sabbath."

On the Carthaginian, Micah did not spend much time discussing America with Captain Hoxworth or Hawaii with his wife. Instead, he tagged along wherever Malama moved, and with her he watched the stars and the dolphin and the changing clouds. The first days were cold, and she wore an Oregon fur that framed her face in caressing beauty, and once when the night wind was blowing the edges of fur about her eyes, Micah felt positively impelled to raise his hand and brush the fur away, whereupon she accidentally leaned upon his fingers, and he felt how remarkably soft her skin was, and he kept his hand near her cheek and then almost unknowingly allowed it to slip around behind her neck, pulling her lips to his. It was the first