Once There Was Fire
Once There Was Fire
A Novel of Old Hawaii
Stephen Shender
Pai’ea Press
Aptos, California
Copyright 2016 by Stephen Shender
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, or digital, including photocopying, recording or any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission of the author.
Maps courtesy of Lahaina Printsellers, Maui, Hawaii
Cover: Kamehameha Landing at O‘ahu, 1795; Copyright Herbert K. Kane, LLC
By permission of the artist’s estate
Publisher imprint design: Linda Pope
ISBN: 0692771336
ISBN 9780692771334
Library of Congress Control Number: 2016917974
Pai’ea Press, APTOS, CALIFORNIA
With love, for Lisa, Melanie, Troy, and Jane
Table of Contents
Pauoa, O‘ahu 1858
Alapa‘i
Waipi‘o Valley, 1748-1753
Kawaihae, 1753-1761
Hilo and Kawaihae, 1761-1762
Pauka‘a, 1763
Kawaihae, 1764
Hōnaunau, 1764
Pauoa, O‘ahu 1858
Kalani‘ ōpu ‘u
Kawaihae and Hana, Maui 1766-1768
Kaupō, Maui 1775
Ka‘awaloa, 1775
Wailua, Northeast Maui; November, 1778
Kealakekua Bay, January, 1779
Kealakekua Bay, February, 1779
Kamā‘oa, Ka‘ū District, 1781
Hōnaunau, 1782
Moku‘ōhai, 1782
Pauoa, O‘ahu 1858
Kamehameha
Hōnaunau, 1782
Laupāhoehoe, Hāmākua Coast, 1783
Hāpu‘u, Kohala, 1784
Honokua, Kona 1785
Hana, Maui 1786
Kailua, Kona, 1789
Kealakekua, 1790
Wailuku, Maui, 1790
Moloka‘i, 1790
Kawaihae, 1791
Kawaihae, 1793
Kawaihae, 1794
Waikiki, 1795
Nu‘uanu Valley, 1795
Kailua, Kona 1796
Kailua-Kona, 1802
Waikiki, 1804
Waikiki, 1810
Kawaihae and Kailua, 1810-1817
Pauoa, O‘ahu 1858
Ka‘ahumanu
Kailua-Kona, May 1819
Kawaihae, May 1819
Kailua-Kona, May 1819
Kawaihae, May 1819
Honokōhau, Kona May 1819
Kailua Kona, May 1819
Ka‘awaloa, November 1819
Kuamo‘o, November 1819
Kailua-Kona, 1859
Afterward
Bibliography
O ke au i kahuli wela ka honua
At the time when the earth became hot
O ke au i kahuli lole kalani
At the time when the heavens turned about
O ke au i kuka‘iaka ka la
At the time when the sun was darkened
E ho‘omalamalama i ka malama
To cause the moon to shine
O ke au o Makali‘i ka po
The time of the rise of the Pleiades
O ka walewale, ho‘okumu honuaia
The slime, this was the source of the earth
O ke kumu o ka lipo, i lipo ai
The source of the darkness that made darkness
O ke kumu o ka Po, i po ai
The source of the night that made night
O ka lipolipo, o ka lipolipo
The intense darkness, the deep darkness
O ka lipo o ka la, o ka lipa o ka po
Darkness of the sun, darkness of the night
Po wale ho—‘I
Nothing but night
Hanau ka po
The night gave birth
Hanau Kumulipo i ka po, he Kāne
Born was Kumulipo in the night, a male
Hanau Po‘eli i ka po, he wahine
Born was Po‘eli in the night, a female
— From the Kumulipo, Hawaiian creation
myth; Beckwith translation, 1951
Wakea was the son of Kahiko-lua-mea,
Papa-giving-birth-to-islands was his first woman,
Wakea and Papa came from far-off Kahiki,
Their firstborn child
Was the island of Hawai‘i,
Maui came next,
Heavy with fetus and sick with pain was Papa
When she bore Maui,
Papa pleaded for relief,
But Wakea was unmoved,
In heavy travail, Papa delivered Kahoolawe,
Another island child born to Papa,
Then she left for far-off Kahiki,
Wakea stayed and took Kaula as his wahine,
Lanai-Kaula was born,
Firstborn of Kaula,
Wakea sought a new woman and found Hina,
Hina lived as wahine to Wakea,
And became pregnant with the island of Moloka‘i,
Papa learned of Wakea’s living with another woman,
Raging with jealousy she returned from Kahiki
And lived with Lua,
A new kāne,
To him she bore O‘ahu,
A new island child,
Papa lived again with Wakea,
She conceived by him and became pregnant
With the island of Kaua‘i,
Gave birth to the island of Kaua‘i,
Ni‘ihau was the afterbirth.
-- From Beckwith, Hawaiian Mythology
Pauoa, O‘ahu 1858
Epono ‘oe ha‘i ka mo‘olelo, Esther, my young wife, urges me. E pono ‘oe ha‘i ka mo‘olelo ka nā kanaka āpau.
You must tell the story, she says. You must tell the story to everyone.
Esther is twenty-four, much younger than I am. Like most of our young people nowadays, she does not fully grasp the way things were with us before the haoles—foreigners—came here. Esther has never known life without them. I tell her my story of the “old days” so she will understand who she is, and so our children will understand who they are, should we have children. Esther is right; I must share my story with others, with as many of our people as I can.
As always, Esther and I speak Hawaiian. Hō‘olu, she says. Please, tell the story. Esther calls for our carriage to take her into Honolulu. It is already late afternoon. She is off to visit two of her young friends, a brother and sister whom she sees frequently. The three of them enjoy modern Honolulu’s whirl of evening soirees and dances. I enjoy such occasions as much as the next man, but I am slowing down now and I find it difficult to keep pace with these younger people. Hence, when Esther goes to see her friends, I sometimes stay home.
Esther departs, leaving me alone with our servants. I am sitting at my writing desk on the lanai of our home in Pauoa, watching the shadows lengthen across the floor of our small valley as the sun sinks toward the sea beyond the Pearl Estuary. Lighting an oil lamp, I take up my pen in the gathering dusk and begin to write.
This is a memoir of the way of our people before the coming of the haoles: before the first English explorers arrived in their tall ships; before the Congregationalist missionaries descended upon us from New England with their religious tracts and their severe moral judgments; before the arrival of the whalers and the merchants and their like.
It is the sum of my father’s and others’ recollections, the recollections of their fathers, their fathers’ fathers, and so on—a steady accretion of fact, legend, and myth reaching
back through the years to a dim, long-ago time when our ancestors crossed thousands of miles of trackless ocean in sail canoes to reach these islands. For ages, our elders preserved these memories in stories they told through meles—chants—and dance, the hula. Nowadays, the old storytellers are dying and the hula is frowned upon, even forbidden. Thus, it has fallen to a few people like me to set our elders’ memories to paper with the haoles’ pen and ink, in hopes that those who come after us will share them, even if the old meles are forgotten.
Most of what I write about transpired well before my own time, and I cannot answer for its veracity. I share what I heard from my father and others who heard stories from still others who may or may not have witnessed the actual events. I am not wholly certain of the haole dates of many of the earliest events I relate. This is unavoidable, for prior to the arrival of one Captain James Cook on our shores, our people marked time in lunar cycles, seasons, and generations. They knew nothing of years.
Our people make distinctions between stories that are kaao and stories that are mo‘olelo. Kaao stories are entirely fanciful tales that we tell for entertainment and amusement. Mo‘olelos embody our true history. This story is a mo‘olelo. It may not be accurate on all its counts, but its core is the truth and that is what matters.
My true birth name is Nāmākeha‘okalani—no more and no less. But since 1840, when the legislature required our people to use two names, including a “Christian” name in the manner of the haoles, I have gone by “Benjamin” Nāmākeha‘okalani. It is no matter. What matters is that I am ali‘i; noble blood runs through my veins. I can trace my bloodline back with certainty two hundred and fifty years. My father was a highborn chief, Kalanimālokuloku, son of Keoua Kalanikupuapa‘ikalaninui. Keoua was the ali‘i moku—high chief—of the Kohala District on the moku nui—the “Big Island”—of Hawai‘i. His father was Kalanike‘eaumoku, and his father—my great-great grandfather—was Keawe II, who ruled Hawai‘i in the days when the haole monarchs King James II and Queen Mary II sat on the English throne. My grandmother’s forbears ruled the island when Queen Elizabeth wore the crown. By mo‘olelo reckoning, I can trace my high-born lineage back nearly seven hundred years to the days of Pili, the first great mō‘ī of all Hawai‘i, who boldly sailed here from distant Samoa, at a time when the haoles’ ancestors still believed that the waters’ horizon marked the end of the earth.
What haole missionary, merchant, or whaler can say the same? Who are they but descendants of the flotsam and jetsam of Europe—of ne’er-do-wells, religious outcasts, and common criminals? They immigrate to our islands in ever-increasing numbers, with little respect for us and less understanding. They would have us forget our own people’s ways and adopt theirs. I have adopted many of their customs, in outward manner at least. But I never forget that I am Hawaiian, and I am resolved that future generations will not forget. This mo‘olelo will be my legacy to them.
The haoles consider our people indolent. We were never thus before they came. We were industrious people. We wrested a living from the land with implements of wood and stone and with our bare hands. We reshaped whole mountainsides into terraced fields, irrigated them, and farmed every inch of arable soil. We bred and cultivated taro for wetland planting and dry-land planting. We grew sweet potatoes, breadfruit, yam, banana, coconut, and sugarcane. We raised pigs, ducks, and geese. From plant fibers and bones we made fishing line and hooks; we wove nets, constructed traps, transformed trees into canoes, and harvested the bounty of the sea.
Occasionally, the sea also delivered a bounty of a different sort than the accustomed fish, octopus, and squid—strange pieces of wood with long, narrow, sharp-pointed objects of an unknown material embedded in them that we would sometimes find washed up on our beaches. These we sometimes called koa li‘ili‘i, or little koa, after the hard wood of the koa trees, from which we fashioned our canoes. Other times, our people called them pahoa, because they were sharp, like our wooden daggers of old. We treasured them as rare gifts from Kanaloa, the god of the sea, and we sometimes affixed them to our clubs to enhance their deadliness. We knew nothing of the haoles’ iron in those days.
We were disciplined people. Our old ways were often hard. Our society was well ordered and our kapus—our laws—were unforgiving.
Over everyone were the ali‘i, the chiefs who kept order among our people. Next were the kāhuna, our priests. The kāhuna guided the chiefs in their decisions. They prayed to the gods, divined their intentions, interceded with them for the chiefs and the common people with sacrifices of animals—and, yes, even human sacrifices—as events demanded or the seasons warranted, and maintained the heiaus, the temples of the gods. In this way, they ensured—as much as they could—that the gods would not become angry with the people and would bless them with abundance.
Other priests tended to our people in times of illness. Still others were expert in the meaning of weather patterns, in astronomy and navigation. They were our high masters of various practical pursuits such as farming, canoe building, and carving.
Below the kāhuna were the maka‘āinana, the “people of the land.” They farmed, fished, and plied crafts as their parents had done before them. The maka‘āinana were hard-working folk upon whom the ali‘i and the kāhuna depended almost entirely for clothing, material goods, and sustenance. They were free people who could come and go as they pleased. Nevertheless, many ali‘i persisted in calling them kānaka—their servants.
Last were the kauwa-maoli, the defiled ones. The kauwa were either born to their low estate or they tumbled into it by defeat in battle. Once kauwa, a person could not hope to rise to a higher state. It was his fate to labor for the maka‘āinana, who in turn accepted their own lot.
The ali‘i, however, were never satisfied with theirs, constantly contending among themselves for power and land. Throughout our history, this contention—between island chieftains and island kingdoms—was ceaseless. Disputes were often settled by war. The ali‘i went to war without consulting the commoners under their protection, calling upon them to take up arms on their behalf whenever they deemed it necessary. The maka‘āinana obeyed their chieftains’ orders without question. To do anything else was forbidden—kapu.
The ali‘i enforced the kapus. The penalty for transgressions was most often death. For example, a commoner could be executed for failing to prostrate himself before a chief, or even for touching the shadow of certain ali‘i. In the haoles’ eyes, and in the eyes of our young people today, these old laws are repugnant. In the old days, however, our chiefs believed that such severe penalties were required to enforce respect for themselves and for their authority, which they believed was essential to preserve order.
As severe as they were, our old laws were tempered by mercy. The laws of the gods—kapu akua—bestowed absolution upon those who ran afoul of kapu ali‘i, the laws of the chiefs. Any person who violated a kapu ali‘i had the right to seek asylum in a sacred place of refuge. If this unfortunate could attain such a place before a chief’s punishment could fall upon him, he was deemed under the gods’ protection. After a time, a kahuna would pardon him and he could then return home, unmolested.
Our gods were many and they invested every aspect of our lives. Our greatest gods were Kāne, Kū, Lono, and Kanaloa. Kāne was the first mover, the creator of all we see. Kū was the god of male strength and plentiful harvests. Kū was also the god of war. Lono was the god of wind, clouds, and rain, and fertility. We looked to Kanaloa, the god of the sea, for bounteous fishing. We had many lesser gods and goddesses. Laka, the goddess of hula, and her sister, Pele, goddess of the volcano, were foremost among them. There were gods of plants and of animals, gods of streams and pools, gods of mist, and gods of fog. Each family had its own guardian god, its ‘aumakua. Truly, everything around us was spiritual. The most important gods required offerings, and Kāne and Kū frequently demanded human sacrifices. But Lono only rarely required human flesh.
Unlike the haoles, we took joy in our bodies. We wer
e people of nature, and sexual pleasure was part of nature’s order, and part of our harmony with nature. For us it was a matter of delight, not denial. Our men could partner with many women, and our women could partner with many men, as love or simple attraction dictated. Still, lifelong unions were common among our people, and for clarity’s sake, I will often speak of “marriage,” “husbands” and “wives,” and even “in-laws.” But in truth, marriage in the haole sense was unknown to our people before the Christian missionaries’ arrival. Thus, no one’s circumstance of birth could ever be a cause for shame among us.
Thus we lived for centuries—secure in our rank, mindful of our laws, and in harmony with our gods and their creation. We had much aloha in our lives, but we did not live tranquilly. We were violent when necessary, as bloodthirsty in war-making as we were lusty in lovemaking. Bloody conflict was a constant among us as our chiefs contended for dominion. But in this respect, we were no worse than the haoles themselves.
We persisted in our intramural bloodletting for hundreds of years, until one man put an end to it by subduing all the islands. That man was my late uncle, Kamehameha. This is his story, as I mostly learned it from his favorite brother—my late father, Kalanimālokuloku, better remembered these days as Keli‘imaika‘i.
Alapa‘i
‘A ‘ohe pu‘u ki‘eki‘e ke ho‘ā‘o ‘ia e pi‘
No cliff is so tall that it cannot be scaled
Waipi‘o Valley, 1748-1753
Kamehameha—“the one set apart”—began life in near isolation, taken from his sleeping mother’s side within hours of his birth and spirited away to a remote farm at the head of the Big Island’s Waipi‘o Valley. This abduction, in the dead of night, almost certainly saved my uncle’s life.
Late in her pregnancy with Kamehameha, it is said that his mother—my grandmother—Keku‘iapoiwa, dreamed she hungered for the eyeball of a chief. Word of Keku‘i’s strange dream-craving reached the ears of Alapa‘i‘nui, the reigning mō‘ī of Hawai‘i. Alapa‘i, then preparing for war against his father-in-law and rival, Kekaulike, the mō‘ī of Maui, was not pleased.
Once There Was Fire: A Novel of Old Hawaii Page 1