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see, and shakinā€™ ever and anon their own particular skeletons, and shettinā€™ ā€™em up aginā€™ in their breast closets.

Well, as we approached nigher and nigher the wharf we see men dressed in every way you could think on from petticoats to pantaloons, and men of every color from black down through brown and yeller to white, and wimmen the same. Well, it wuznā€™t long before we wuz ensconced in the comfortable tarven where we put up. Elder Wessel and his daughter and Evangeline Noble went to the same tarven, which made me glad, for I like ā€™em both as stars differinā€™. Elder Wessel I regarded more as one of the little stars in the Milky Way, but Evangeline as one of the big radiant orbs that flashed over our heads in them tropic nights.

The tarven we went to wuz called the Hawaiian Hotel. We got good comfortable rooms, Arvillyā€™s beinā€™ nigh to ourn and Dorothyā€™s and Miss Meechimā€™s acrost the hall and the rest of the company comfortably located not fur away. Well, the next morninā€™ Josiah and I with Tommy walked through some of the broad beautiful streets, lined with houses built with broad verandas most covered with vines and flowers and shaded by the most beautiful trees you ever see, tall palms with their stems round and smooth as my rollinā€™ pin piercinā€™ the blue sky, and fur, fur up the long graceful leaves, thirty feet long some on ā€™em. And eucalyptus and begoniea and algebora with its lovely foliage, and pepper trees and bananas and pomegranates and tamarind and bread fruit and rose apples, tastinā€™ and smellinā€™ a good deal like a rosy. And magnificent oleanders and fuchias and geraniums and every other beautiful tree and blossom you ever hearn on.

And take it with these rich colored posies and luxuriant green foliage and the white suits and hats of the men, and the gay colored clothing of the women we met, lots of them with wreaths of flowers round their necks hanginā€™ most to their feet, take it all together it wuz a seen long, long to be 110 remembered. And then we walked up on Punch Bowl Hill, five hundred feet above the level of the sea, and looked off on a broad beautiful picture of sea, mountain and valley soft and beautiful and a-bloom with verdure, and anon bold, rugged and sublime, and I sez to Josiah:

ā€œThis very place where weā€™re standinā€™ now wuz once a volcano and belched forth flames, and that also,ā€ sez I, pintinā€™ to Tantalus that riz up two thousand feet. ā€œAnd,ā€ sez I, ā€œthey say that the view from that is glorious.ā€

ā€œWell,ā€ sez he, ā€œI guess we hadnā€™t better climb up there; it might bust out agin. And I wouldnā€™t have you sot fire to, Samantha, for a thousand worlds like this,ā€ (he didnā€™t want the work of climbinā€™, that wuz it). And I didnā€™t argy with him, for I thought it would be quite a pull for us to git up there and git Tommy up, and I didnā€™t know as the child ort to climb so fur, so I didnā€™t oppose my pardner when he propsed to go back to the tarven, and we santered back through the streets filled with citizens of all countries and dressed accordinā€™, to the grounds around the tarven. We put Tommy into a hammock and sot down peaceful nigh by him. The sun shone down gloriously out of a clear blue sky, but we sot in the shade and so enjoyed it, the bammy air about us seemed palpitating with langrous beauty and fragrance, and I sez to my pardner:

ā€œDonā€™t this remind you, Josiah, of what weā€™ve heard Thomas J. read about:

ā€œā€˜The island valley of Avileon

 Where falls not rain nor hail nor any snow.ā€™ā€

ā€œWhere it seems always afternoon.ā€

ā€œI dā€™no,ā€ sez Josiah, ā€œas I ever hearn of such a land. I never wuz any hand to lay abed all the forenoon.ā€

ā€œBut, Josiah, there is sunthinā€™ so dreamy and soothinā€™, so restful in the soft slumbrous atmosphere, it seems as if one could jest lay down in that hammock, look off onto the 111 entrancinā€™ beauty around, breathinā€™ the soft balmy air, and jest lay there forever.ā€

ā€œI guess,ā€ sez he, ā€œthat the dinner bell would be apt to roust you out the second or third day.ā€

But Miss Meechim jined us at jest this minute, and she sez to me, ā€œI feel just as you do, I feel as though I would fain dwell here forever.ā€

And Josiah sez: ā€œI believe it would be a good thing for you, Miss Meechim, to stay here right along; you could probable do considerable good here preachinā€™ to the natives aginst marriage, theyā€™re pretty apt to marry too much if theyā€™re let alone, and you might curb ā€™em in some.ā€ (Josiah canā€™t bear Miss Meechim, her idees on matrimony are repugnant to him.) But she didnā€™t argy with him. She sez: ā€œRobert is planning a trip to the Pali, and wants to know if you wonā€™t join us.ā€

And Josiah says, ā€œWho is Pali?ā€

And she sez, ā€œIt is the precipice five hundred feet high, where King Kamehameha drove off his enemies.ā€

Well, we wuz agreeable and jined the party. Robert had got a wagonette and he and Dorothy, Miss Meechim and Arvilly and Josiah and I jest filled the seats, Tommy sot in Josiahā€™s lap or between us.

It is quite a long ride to the Pali, but we didnā€™ realize it, because the scenery all along is so lovely and so novel. That view from the top I hainā€™t a-goinā€™ to try to describe, nor I shaā€™nā€™t let Josiah try; I donā€™t like to have that man flat out in his undertakinā€™s. Good land! do you want us to tell how many sands there wuz on the flashing white beach that stretched out milds and milds? And we might as well as to describe that enchantinā€™ panorama and take up all the different threads of glory that lay before us and embroider ā€™em on language. No, you must see ā€™em for yourself, and then you hainā€™t goinā€™ to describe ā€™em. I dā€™no but Carabi could. I hearn Tommy talkinā€™ and ā€œwonnerinā€™ā€ to him as he stood awestruck beside me, but no mortal can.

112

Well, I thought I must not slight the volcano Kilauea, which means the House of Everlasting Fire. And how that volcano and everything in Hawaii reminded me of the queen who once rained hereā€“ā€“and the interview I once had with her. We happened to be visitors to the same summer resort. You know she lives in Washington, D. C., now.

I sent word that I wuz there and craved a augence, which wuz gladly granted. She had hearn of me and I had hearn of her, which made everything agreeable. So at the appinted hour I wuz ushered by one of her hired men into her presence. I liked her looks first rate; of course she hainā€™t what you may call handsome, and her complection is pretty middlinā€™ dark, but she has a good look and a good way with her. She came forward and greeted me with great cordiality and gin the hand I extended a warm grasp, and I hern visey versey, and sez she:

ā€œI am glad to see you, Josiah Allenā€™s wife.ā€ And I sez, speakinā€™ the name Liliukolani well as I could, ā€œI also am glad to hail the Queen of the Sandwich Islands.ā€

That tickled her, and she sez: ā€œI was not deceived in you; you are one who can recognize royalty if the cloud of adversity and trouble is wreathinā€™ it in its black folds.ā€

And I sez, ā€œClouds often covers the sun and moon, but the light is there jest the same.ā€ I felt to pity her as she went on and related her troubles to me. Her throne kicked out from under her by them that wanted to set down on it, the high chairs of her loyal friends took by her enemies who craved the soft cushions. Even her private property grabbed away from her. Why, how should any of us feel to have a neighbor walk in when we wuz havinā€™ a family quarrel and jest clean us out of everythingā€“ā€“kitchen stove, bureau, bed and beddinā€™ and everything; why, it would rile us to our depths, any on us.

She sez, ā€œI feel that my kingdom wuz stole away from me.ā€ And I sez:

ā€œI know jest how you feel. There wuz a woodsy island 113 down in our creek that Josiah had called hisen for years and years, rained peaceful and prosperous over so we spozed, it made a dretful handy place for our young stock to stand in the shade in the summer, and our ducks and geese jest made their hum there, but what should Bill Yerden do when he bought the old Shelmadine place but jest scoop up that island and try to prove that it wuz hisen. It wuz jest stealinā€™, Josiah and I always felt so. But he wuz down with tizik at the time, and I wore out nussinā€™ him, and Bill put bob iron fence round it, real sharp bobs, too, and we had to gin in. Of course it wuznā€™t a big spot, but we despised the idee of havinā€™ it took from us just as much as though it wuz the hull contient of Asia, and we canā€™t git over it, Josiah nor me canā€™t. And I know jest how you feel, and I sympathize with you.ā€

And she sez, ā€œSympathy is sweet, but justice is sweeter.ā€

And I sez, ā€œThat is so, but when you canā€™t git justice, sympathy is better than nothinā€™.ā€

ā€œYes,ā€ sez she, ā€œI know it, but I am lookinā€™ forward to the day when I shall git my rights agin. I am jest as much a queen as Queen Alexandra is to-day, and my kingdom is just as much mine.ā€

Sez I, ā€œThat is just the way Josiah and I feel; we canā€™t help lookinā€™ forward to gittinā€™ our rights, but donā€™t spoze we ever shall, for life is short, and Josiah donā€™t want any more of our live stock tore up on them bobs; and, as Iā€™ve said to Josiah many a time, Bill Yerden feels guilty, or he wouldnā€™t rare up such sharp defences round it.ā€

Well, we had a good deal more of jest such profitable and interestinā€™ talk as two such great wimmen would naterally, and we parted away from each other with a cordial hand shake and mutual good feelinā€™. But she called me back and sez she: ā€œI want to give you one word of solemn warninā€™ before we part,ā€ and I stopped stun still and listened.

ā€œI donā€™t know,ā€ sez she, ā€œas youā€™ll ever be a queen.ā€

ā€œWell, mebby not,ā€ sez I, ā€œbut I am thought a sight on in Jonesville, and there is no knowinā€™ what may happen.ā€

114

ā€œWell,ā€ sez she, ā€œif you ever are a queen, a ruler of a kingdom, donā€™t let any other nation protect you. Protectinā€™,ā€ sez she, ā€œhas been the ruin of more than one individual and nation.ā€

And I promised her that I would look out for it if I ever wuz a queen, but reminded her that there wuz times too when it came handy, and saved our necks to be protected, and then I finished, gracefully backinā€™ out of her presence. I like her first rate, and believe she is a likely woman; I believe she has been lied about, she jest the same as told me she had; if she wuz a woman that took in washinā€™s for a livinā€™ there wouldnā€™t have been so much said about her. Why, it is jest as easy for envious folks to run them high in position and try to demean ā€™em as it is to fall off a log.

115 CHAPTER X

Some of the party felt that they couldnā€™t leave the islands without seeinā€™ the great Kilauea and some didnā€™t care to go. I felt that I must see it and so did Arvilly, and Josiah looked on me as fondly and proudly as if I myself wuz a volcano and said, ā€œIf Samantha goes I shall.ā€ Robert Strong wanted to go and so did Dorothy; Miss Meechim didnā€™t feel like going and offered to take care of Tommy with the help of Aronette. Elder Wessel wouldnā€™t go, for Lucia wuznā€™t very well and he felt that she had better stay and rest at the tarven, and I spozed that Aronette and Lucia would have a pretty good time, for they always seemed to when they wuz together. Evangeline Noble was visiting some friends of hers on the island. There wuz a smart young English clergyman goinā€™ with us and a Scotchman, both good lookinā€™ and good actinā€™. The Scotchman wuz Sir Duncan Ramsey and didnā€™t act any more sot up than if he wuz a plain mister. He

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