t twenty-five cents a day until he has worked
off the amount. Accordingly, the liquor-trade is followed by very few
persons, and the consumption of drink by the natives is very much
curtailed,--compared, for instance, with what it is among the
drink-consuming natives of New Zealand, who are allowed to swallow the
"fire-water," to the great profit of the publicans and to their own
demoralization, without any restriction whatever.

I find the Government here also levies a very considerable sum from
the Chinese, for the privilege of selling opium. It is put up annually
to auction, and in some years as much as forty-five thousand dollars
have been paid for the monopoly, though this year it has brought
considerably less in consequence of the dulness of trade. From this
circumstance it will be inferred that there is a considerable Chinese
population in the place. Indeed, some of the finest stores in Honolulu
are kept by Chinamen. I did not at first observe many of these people
about; but afterwards, when exploring, I found whole back-streets
full of Chinamen's huts and houses.

From the announcements of theatrical and other entertainments I see
about, the people here must be very fond of amusement. Indeed,
Honolulu seems to be one of the great centres of pleasure in the
Pacific. All wandering "stars" come hither. When I was at Auckland, in
New Zealand, I went to the theatre to see a troupe of Japanese
jugglers. I had seen the identical troupe in London, and "All Right"
was amongst them. They were on their way to Honolulu, to star it here
before returning to Japan. Charles Mathews, with whom I made the
voyage from Melbourne to Sydney, is also advertised to appear, "for a
few nights only," at the Royal Hawaiian Theatre.[16] And now here is
The Bandman, my fellow-passenger from Auckland, advertised, in big
placards, as "The World-renowned Shaksperian Player," &c., who is
about to give a series of such and such representations at the same
place.

Beautiful though the island of Oahu may be, I soon found that I could
not live there. Even in winter it was like living in a hothouse. The
air was steamy with heat, and frightfully relaxing. At intervals my
nose streamed with blood, and I grew sensibly thinner. Then I suffered
terribly from the musquitoes; my ankles were quite swollen with their
bites, and in a day or two more I should have been dead-lame. There
are, besides, other tormentors--small flies, very like the Victorian
san