e eaten it. Conceiving
that he had acquired what our ward statesmen call a "pull" with
these helpers, he planned an elaborate fish-pond and put them at
work again. He had staked off such an immense area that the little
people could not possibly finish it by morning. As light streaked
the east and the cocks crew they scampered away to the mountains,
dripping with sweat and angered at the man who had so abused their
willingness. And they could never be induced to work for him again.

Although of supernatural power themselves, the little people are
religious, and have built several houses to the gods. On the face of
the mountain wall, two thousand feet high, back of the leper settlement
at Molokai, is a ledge that can be reached neither from above nor
below, and on it stands a temple of their construction. In Pepeeko,
Hilo, the natives labored for a month in quarrying and dressing stone,
but when it was ready the elves built their temple in a night. So at
Kohala they formed a chain twelve miles long between the quarry and
the site, and, passing the blocks from hand to hand, finished the
great enclosure before sunrise.

Yet these fairies had a taste for mischief, and could be as active
in it as so many boys. When a child on Maui, Laka was so loved by
his father that he would travel many miles to buy a toy for him, and
hearing of a strange new plaything in Hawaii, the father sailed to
that island to get it. He never returned, for the natives killed him
and hid his skeleton in a cave. When Laka had come to man's estate he
began preparations for a voyage to that island, that he might either
find his father or know his fate, for of his death he did not learn
until long after. In these preparations he was oddly thwarted. Every
time he hewed down a tree for a canoe it was gone in the morning. Out
of patience, he resolved to catch the thieves. In order to make their
task especially hard, he dug a hole into which the tree fell, when he
had chopped it, so that his enemies would have to lift it out before
they could carry it away. Then, in the shadow, he waited. At midnight
a small humming and giggling were heard in the bushes and a company
of menehune stole out into the shine of the moon. They began to tug
at the fallen tree. Laka sprang upon them and captured two, the others
running away with shrill screams. Laka threatened to kill his prisoners
for the trouble they had made, but he did not really intend to hurt
them. Their tears