11.  PAKAA AND KUAPAKAA[1]

Pakaa, the favorite of Keawenuiaumi, king of Hawaii, regulates the distribution of land, has charge of the king’s household, keeps his personal effects, and is sailing master for his double canoe.  The king gives him land in the six districts of Hawaii.  He owns the paddle, Lapakahoe, and the wooden calabash with netted cover in which are the bones of his mother, Laamaomao, whose voice the winds obey.

Two men, Hookeleiholo and Hookeleipuna, ruin him with the king.  So, taking the king’s effects, his paddle and calabash, he sails away to Molokai where he marries a high chiefess and has a son, Kuapakaa, named after the king’s cracked skin from drinking awa.  He plants fields in the uplands marked out like the districts of Hawaii, and trains his son in all the lore of Hawaii.

The king dreams that Pakaa reveals to him his residence in Kaula.  His love for the man returns and he sets out with a great retinue to seek him.  Pakaa foresees the king’s arrival and goes to meet him and bring him to land.  He conceals his own face under the pretense of fishing, and leaves the son to question the expedition.  First pass the six canoes of the district chiefs of Hawaii, and Kuapakaa sings a derisive chant for each, calling him by name.  Then he inquires their destination and sings a prophecy of storm.  The king’s sailing masters, priests, and prophets deny the danger, but the boy again and again repeats the warning.  He names the winds of all the islands in turn, then calls the names of the king’s paddlers.  Finally he uncovers the calabash, and the canoes are swamped and the whole party is obliged to come ashore.  Pakaa brings the king the loin cloth and scented tapa he has had in keeping, prepares his food in the old way, and makes him so comfortable that the king regrets his old servant.  The party is weather-bound four months.  As they proceed, they carry the boy Kuapakaa with them.  He blows up a storm in which the two sailing masters are drowned, and carries the rest of the party safe back to Kawaihae, Kohala.  Here the boy is forgotten, but by a great racing feat, in which he wins against his contestants by riding in near shore in the eddy caused by their flying canoes, thus coming to the last stretch unwearied, he gets the lives of his father’s last enemies.  Then he makes known to the king his parentage, and Pakaa is returned to all his former honors.

[Footnote 1:  This story Fornander calls “the most famous in Hawaiian history.”]

12.  KALAEPUNI

The older brother of Kalaehina and son of Kalanipo and Kamelekapu, is born and raised in Holualoa, Kona, in the reign of Keawenuiaumi.  He is mischievous and without fear.  At 6 he can outdo all his playmates, at 20 he is fully developed, kills sharks with his hands and pulls up a kou tree as if it were a blade of grass.  The king hides himself, and Kalaepuni rules Hawaii.  The priest Mokupane plots his death.  He has a pit dug on Kahoolawe, presided over by two old people who are told to look out for a very large man with long hair like bunches of olona fiber.  Once Kalaepuni goes out shark killing and drifts to this island.  The old people give him fish to eat, but send him to the pit to get water; then throw down stones on his head until he dies, at the place called Keanapou.