An Epoch in History | Page 2

while the moon still shone with resplendent glory just above the
nearer rim of the old extinct volcanic crater lying just behind the town.
High points of land lay around us on three sides, while across the bay
soft billowy clouds completed an enchanting circle from the spell of
which none of us wished ever to escape.

No traveler who lands at Honolulu will feel unrequited for his time and
his money should he visit two places in the vicinity of the town. The
first is the Pali and the second, the Bishop Museum of Polynesian
Ethnology.
The first is a gigantic precipice, reached by a few hours ride from the
city by horse. As one reaches the precipice, there spreads out before
him at a dizzying depth below a verdant plain, bounded in the distance
by an emerald sea. The wind which always blows in tropical countries
is gathered in between the long projecting arms of a mountain chain
and rushes over the face of cliff with such force that it is said by
travelers to be one of the strongest continual winds on the globe.
The Bishop Museum of Polynesian Ethnology contains the finest
collection in existence of things illustrating the life and customs of
Polynesia. Among other things, the visitor is shown the personal god of
war of that sovereign whose grand-child was the last to hold the sceptre
of the Kanakas. There are royal documents to prove that more than one
thousand men have been beheaded before this grim-faced old idol. Here,
too, is the famous robe of birds' feathers, made to please the fancy of
this same grim old monarch. The feathers of which this strange, but
really elegant, robe is made are of a reddish color. The birds from
which they were plucked were found only in the Hawaiian Islands and
each bird had only four feathers, two being under each wing. The
extinction of the bird is attributed to the making of this royal robe. So
many of them were needed that hundreds of hunters were employed a
score or more of years to secure the number required. Placing the
wages of the hunters at a reasonable figure, the value of the robe is over
three hundred thousand dollars.
At Honolulu one sees also that famous sport of the South Sea Islanders,
surf-shooting. The native wades far out into the surf with a long narrow
board and then sits astride of it upon the surface of the water. As the
long billows come rolling in, he places his board upon the convex
surface of an advancing wave, then, with the poise of a rope-dancer, he
places his weight properly upon the plank and is shot forward with
precipitate rapidity.

Between Honolulu and Manila lies the imaginary line where the days
of the week are supposed to begin and end. It has long been a custom
among sailors to hold the "Revels of Neptune" on the night after a
vessel crosses either the International Date Line or the Equator, and the
ship is then turned over to the crew. Even the petty officers of the ship
are not free from being made the objects of the sport, and passengers of
especial prominence have often been treated to a bath in a tub of cold
water or had their faces lathered with a broom as a shaving brush while
a bar of old iron served the purpose of a razor.
A naval lieutenant on the battleship which conveyed Napoleon from
London to St. Helena, writing to one of the court ladies in London,
states that Napoleon offered the sailors four hundred dollars in gold and
actually gave them eighty-five dollars to escape being ducked in a tub
of cold water and shaved with a rough iron hoop when they crossed the
equator.[A]
[A] Century Magazine for September, 1889.
We reached the line on Thursday night and awoke a few hours later on
Saturday morning, having lost a day in revelry.
CHAPTER II.
MANILA.
One would imagine the water of Manila Bay to be as tranquil as a lake
should conclusions be drawn from its almost landlocked position. On
the contrary, it is noted among sailors the world over for the roughness
of its waters; and a breakwater behind which ships can lie in quiet and
take on or discharge their cargoes is essential to the proper
development of the city's shipping. But, so far as we were concerned,
this was a possible joy of the future. So, one by one we descended the
narrow stairway at the side of the ship, and then leaped at opportune
moments to the decks of the dancing steam launches below. How it
ever came to pass that each of us, ladies and all, in succession went
through with this mid-air acrobatic