“Owhyhee (Hawaii), the principal, is the first to the southward and eastward, the rest run in a direction nearly northwest.  The names of the principals are Mowee (Maui), Morotoy (Molokai), Ranai (Lanai), Whahoo (Oahu), Attooi (Kauai), and Oneehow (Niihau).”

This account Dixon gives of two curious and rather valuable words:  “The moment a chief concludes a bargain, he repeats the word Coocoo thrice, with quickness, and is immediately answered by all the people in his canoe with the word Whoah, pronounced in a tone of exclamation, but with greater or less energy, in proportion as the bargain he has made is approved.”

The great and celebrated Kamehameha, who consolidated the government of the islands, did it by an act of treachery and murder, thus told in Alexander’s history: 

“The Assassination of Keoua.—­Toward the end of the year 1791 two of Kamehameha’s chief counsellors, Kamanawa and Keaweaheulu, were sent on an embassy to Keoua at Kahuku in Kau.  Keoua’s chief warrior urged him to put them to death, which he indignantly refused to do.

“By smooth speeches and fair promises they persuaded him to go to Kawaihae, and have an interview with Kamehameha, in order to put an end to the war, which had lasted nine years.  Accordingly he set out with his most intimate friends and twenty-four rowers in his own double canoe, accompanied by Keaweaheulu in another canoe, and followed by friends and retainers in other canoes.

“As they approached the landing at Kawaihae, Keeaumoku surrounded Keoua’s canoe with a number of armed men.  As Kamakau relates:  ’Seeing Kamehameha on the beach, Keoua called out to him, “Here I am,” to which he replied, “Rise up and come here, that we may know each other."’

“As Keoua was in the act of leaping ashore, Keeaumoku killed him with a spear.  All the men in Keoua’s canoe and in the canoes of his immediate company were slaughtered but one.  But when the second division approached, Kamehameha gave orders to stop the massacre.  The bodies of the slain were then laid upon the altar of Puukohola as an offering to the blood-thirsty divinity Kukailimoku.  That of Keoua had been previously baked in an oven at the foot of the hill as a last indignity.  This treacherous murder made Kamehameha master of the whole island of Hawaii, and was the first step toward the consolidation of the group under one government.”

This is one of those gentle proceedings of an amiable race, whose massacre of Captain Cook has been so elaborately vindicated by alleged exponents of civilization.

There is found the keynote of the grevious native government in an incident of the date of 1841 by which “the foreign relations of the government became involved with the schemes of a private firm.  The firm of Ladd & Co. had taken the lead in developing the agricultural resources of the islands by their sugar plantation at Koloa and in other ways, and had gained the entire confidence of the king and chiefs.