orbit, all of which was done with the precision worthy of an
acrobat, an accomplishment attained only after long practice.
It was a hula of classic celebrity, and was performed without
the accompaniment of instrumental music.

[Footnote 368: _Palani_, French, so called at Moanalua because
a woman who was its chief exponent was a Catholic, one of the
"poe Palani." Much odium has been laid to the charge of the
hula on account of the supposed indecency of the motion
termed _ami_. There can be no doubt that the ami was at times
used to represent actions unfit for public view, and so far
the blame is just. But the ami did not necessarily nor always
represent obscenity, and to this extent the hula has been
unjustly maligned.]

In the mele now to be given the poet calls up a succession of
pictures by imagining himself in one scenic position after
another, beginning at Hilo and passing in order from one
island to another--omitting, however, Maui--until he finds
himself at Kilauea, an historic and traditionally interesting
place on the windward coast of the garden-island, Kauai. The
order of travel followed by the poet forbids the supposition
that the Kilauea mentioned is the great caldera of the
volcano on Hawaii in which Pele had her seat.

It is useless to regret that the poet did not permit his muse
to tarry by the way long enough to give us something more
than a single eyeshot at the quickly shifting scenes which
unrolled themselves before him, that so he might have given
us further reminiscence of the lands over which his Pegasus
bore him. Such completeness of view, however, is alien to the
poesy of Hawaii.
[Page 203]

_Mele_

A Hilo au e, hoolulu ka lehua[369];
A Wai-luku la, i ka Lua-kanaka[370];
A Lele-iwi[371] la, au i ke kai;
A Pana-ewa[372], i ka ulu-lehna;
5 A Ha-ili[373], i ke kula-manu;
A Mologai, i ke ala-kahi,
Ke kula o Kala'e[374] wela i ka la;
Mauna-loa[375] la, Ka-lua-ko'i[376], e;
Na hala o Nihoa[377], he mapuna la;