ing a
stone or a bunch of grass on a ledge near some precipice. If you look, you
will see other objects of the same kind lying there. Ask him about it and
he will tell you, with a laugh, that his forefathers in other times did
so, and he does the same. It is, in fact, a peace offering to the
local divinity of the place. Is he, then, an idolater? Not at all; not
necessarily, at least. He is under the compulsion of an old custom; and
he will even tell you that it is all nonsense. The same force leads him
to treat with respect and veneration a chief or chiefess even if abjectly
poor, though before the law the highest chief is no better than the common
people.

They are hearty and even gross feeders; and probably the only
christianized people who live almost entirely on cold victuals. A Hawaiian
does not need a fire to prepare a meal; and at a _luau_, or feast, all the
food is served cold, except the pig, which ought to be hot.

Hospitable and liberal as he is in his daily life, when the Hawaiian
invites his friends to a _luau_ he expects them to pay. He provides for
them roast pig, poi, baked ti-root, which bears a startling resemblance in
looks and taste to New England molasses-cake; raw fish and shrimps, limu,
which is a sea-moss of villainous odor; kuulaau, a mixture of taro and
cocoa-nut, very nice; paalolo, a mixture of sweet-potato and cocoa-nut;
raw and cooked cuttle-fish, roast dog, sea-eggs, if they can be got; and,
if the feast is something above the ordinary, raw pickled salmon with
tomatoes and red-pepper.

The object of such a luau is usually to enable the giver to pay for his
new house, or to raise money for some private object of his own. Notice
of the coming feast is given months beforehand, as also of the amount each
visitor is expected to give. It will be a twenty-five cent, or a fifty
cent, or a dollar luau. The pigs--the centre-piece of the feast--have
been fattening for a year before. The affair is much discussed. It is
indispensable that all who attend shall come in brand-new clothing, and a
native person will rather deny himself the feast than appear in garments
which have been worn before. A few of the relatives of the feast-giver act
as stewards, and they must be dressed strictly alike. At one luau which I
had the happiness to attend the six men who acted as stewards were arrayed
in green cotton shirts and crimson cotton trowsers, and had green wreaths
on their heads. I need not say that they pre