ready referred to; they cannot administer a
trust--I was told there had never yet been a case known. Even a judge,
skilled in the knowledge of the law and upright in its administration,
was found insusceptible of those duties and distinctions which appear so
natural and come so easy to the European. But the disability stands
alone, a single survival in the midst of change; and the faults of the
modern Hawaiian incline to the other side. My orator of Hookena
court-room may be a gentleman much maligned; I may have received his
character from the lips of his political opponents; but the type
described is common. The islands begin to fill with lawyers; many of
whom, justly or unjustly, are disbarred; and to the age of Kamehameha,
the age of Glossin has succeeded. Thus none would rob the store of the
Portuguese, but the law was wrested to oppress him.

It was of old a warlike and industrious race. They were diggers and
builders; the isles are still full of their deserted monuments; the
modern word for law, Kanawai, "water rights," still serves to remind us
of their ancient irrigation. And the island story is compact of battles.
Their courage and goodwill to labour seems now confined to the sea,
where they are active sailors and fearless boatmen, pursue the shark in
his own element, and make a pastime of their incomparable surf. On shore
they flee equally from toil and peril, and are all turned to carpet
occupations and to parlous frauds. Nahinu, an ex-judge, was paid but two
dollars for a hard day in court, and he is paying a dollar a day to the
labourers among his coffee. All Hawaiians envy and are ready to compete
with him for this odd chance of an occasional fee for some hours'
talking; he cannot find one to earn a certain hire under the sun in his
plantation, and the work is all transacted by immigrant Chinese. One
cannot but be reminded of the love of the French middle class for office
work; but in Hawaii, it is the race in bulk that shrinks from manly
occupation. During a late revolution, a lady found a powerful young
Hawaiian crouching among the grass in her garden. "What are you doing
here?" she cried, for she was a strong partisan. "Do you not know they
are murdering your king?" "I know," said the skulker. "Why do you not go
to help him?" she asked. "Aflaid," said the poor craven, and crouched
again among the grass. Here was a strange grandchild for the warriors
that followed or faced Kamehameha. I give the singular