a
short skirt, made of bark cloth or of the ki leaves, which reaches from
the waist half down to the knees. The old popular songs show clearly that
this costume has always been worn by the natives. To go naked was regarded
as a sign of madness, or as a mark of divine birth. Sometimes the kings
were attended by a man sprung from the gods, and this happy mortal alone
had the right to follow, _puris naturalibus_, his august master. The
people said, in speaking of him, _He akua ia_, he is a god.

_Kapa_, a kind of large sheet in which the chiefs dressed themselves, was
made of the soaked and beaten bark of several shrubs, such as the wauke,
olona, hau, oloa. Fine varieties were even made of the kukui (_Aleurites
moluccana_). In ancient times it was an offense punishable with death for
a common man to wear a double kapa or malo.

The Hawaiians have never worn shoes. In certain districts where lava is
very abundant, they make sandals (_kamaa_) with the leaves of the ki and
pandanus. They always go bare-headed, except in battle, where they like
to exhibit themselves adorned with a sort of helmet made of twigs and
feathers.

The women never wear any thing but flowers on their heads. Tattooing was
known, but less practiced than at the Marquesas, and much more rudely.

The Hawaiians are not cannibals. They have been upbraided in Europe as
eaters of human flesh, but such is not the case. They have never killed a
man for food. It is true that in sacrifices they eat certain parts of the
victim, but there it was a religious rite, not an act of cannibalism. So,
also, when they ate the flesh of their dearest chiefs, it was to do honor
to their memory by a mark of love: they never eat the flesh of bad chiefs.

The Hawaiians do not deny that the entrails of Captain Cook were eaten;
but they insist that it was done by children, who mistook them for the
viscera of a hog, an error easily explained when it is known that the body
had been opened and stripped of as much flesh as possible, to be burned
to ashes, as was due the body of a god. The officers of the distinguished
navigator demanded his bones, but as they were destroyed,[B] those of a
Kanaka were surrendered in their stead, receiving on board the ships of
the expedition the honors intended for the unfortunate commander.

The condition of the women among the ancient Hawaiians was like that of
servants well treated by their masters. The chiefesses alone enjoyed equal
rights with m