emands on the
vocabulary and has strained the idioms of our speech
well-nigh to the point of protest.

In lines 1, 2, 4, 8, 14, and 23 the word _Lani_ means a
prince or princess, a high chief or king, a heavenly one. In
lines 12, 13, 18, and 20 the same word _lani_ means the
heavens, a concept in the Hawaiian mind that had some
far-away approximation to the Olympus of classic Greece.

_Mele_

Ooe no paha ia, e ka lau o ke aloha,
Oia no paha ia ke kau mai nei ka hali'a.
Ke hali'a-li'a mai nei ka maka,
Manao hiki mai no paha an anei.
5 Hiki mai no la ia, na wai e uwe aku?
Ua pau kau la, kau ike iaia;
Ka manawa oi' e ai ka manao iloko.
Ua luu iho nei an i ke kai nui;
Nui ka ukiuki, paio o ka naau.
10 Aone kanaka eha ole i ke aloha.
A wahine e oe, kanaka e au;
He mau alualu ka ha'i e lawe.
Ike aku i ke kula i'a o Ka-wai-nui.
Nui ka opala ai o Moku-lana.
15 Lana ka limu pae hewa o Makau-wahine.
O ka wahine no oe, o ke kane no ia.
Hiki mai no la ia, na wai e uwe aku?
Hoi mai no la ia, a ia wai e uwe aku?

[Page 83]

[Translation]

_Song_

Methinks it is you, leaf plucked from Love's tree,
You mayhap, that stirs my affection.
There's a tremulous glance of the eye,
The thought she might chance yet to come:
5 But who then would greet her with song?
Your day has flown, your vision of her--
A time this for gnawing the heart.
I've plunged just now in deep waters:
Oh the strife and vexation of soul!
10 No mortal goes scathless of love.
A wife thou estranged, I a husband estranged,
Mere husks to be cast to the swine.[203]
Look, the swarming of fish at the weir!
Their feeding grounds on the reef
15 Are waving with mosses abundant.
Thou art the woman, that one your man--
At her coming who'll greet her with