My wreath-maker dwells at Waimea. Partnered is she to the swirling river; They plant with flowers the sandy lea, 10 While the bearded surf, tossed by the breeze, Vaunts on the hills as the sun-bow, Looks on the crystal stream Makaweli, And in the wildwood makes her abode With Hinahina of silvern wreaths. 15 Koaea’s a speck to the eye, Under the low-hanging rain-cloud, Woodland home of the plaintive ó-ó. From frost-bitten Pa-ie-ie I bid you, guess me the fable: 20 Paddle-maker on Pele’s mount. This mele comes from Kauai, an Island in many respects individualized from the other parts of the group and that seems to have been the nurse of a more delicate imagination than was wont to flourish elsewhere. Its tone is archaic, and it has the rare merit of not transfusing the more crudely erotic human emotions into the romantic sentiments inspired by nature. The Hawaiians dearly loved fable and allegory. Argument or truth, dressed out in such fanciful garb, gained double force and acceptance. We may not be able to follow a poet in his wanderings; his local allusions may obscure to us much of his meaning; the doctrine of his allegory may be to us largely a riddle; and the connection between the body of its thought and illustration and the application, or solution, of the poetical conundrum may be past our comprehension; but the [Page 112] play of the poet’s fancy, whether childish or mature, is an interesting study, and brings us closer in human sympathy to the people who took pleasure in such things. In translating this poem, while not following literally the language of the poet, the aim has been to hit the target of his deeper meaning, without hopelessly involving the reader in the complexities of Hawaiian color and local topography. A few words of explanation must suffice. The _Makani Inu-wai_ (verse 1)—known to all the islands—is a wind that dries up vegetation, literally a water-drinking wind. The _Naulu_ (verse 3) is the ordinary sea-breeze at Waimea, Kauai, sometimes accompanied by showers. _Hala-li’i_ (verse 5) is a sandy plain on Niihau, and the peculiarity of its canes is that they sprawl along on the ground, and are often to a considerable extent covered by the loose soil. _Lehua_ (verse 6) is the well-known bird-island, lying north of Niihau and visible from the Waimea side of Kauai.