And there was a large temple near at hand which was built in a single night, in the midst of storm and thunder and rain, by the ghastly hands of dead men!  Tradition says that by the weird glare of the lightning a noiseless multitude of phantoms were seen at their strange labor far up the mountain side at dead of night—­flitting hither and thither and bearing great lava-blocks clasped in their nerveless fingers—­appearing and disappearing as the pallid lustre fell upon their forms and faded away again.  Even to this day, it is said, the natives hold this dread structure in awe and reverence, and will not pass by it in the night.

At noon I observed a bevy of nude native young ladies bathing in the sea, and went and sat down on their clothes to keep them from being stolen.  I begged them to come out, for the sea was rising and I was satisfied that they were running some risk.  But they were not afraid, and presently went on with their sport.  They were finished swimmers and divers, and enjoyed themselves to the last degree.

They swam races, splashed and ducked and tumbled each other about, and filled the air with their laughter.  It is said that the first thing an Islander learns is how to swim; learning to walk being a matter of smaller consequence, comes afterward.  One hears tales of native men and women swimming ashore from vessels many miles at sea—­more miles, indeed, than I dare vouch for or even mention.  And they tell of a native diver who went down in thirty or forty-foot waters and brought up an anvil!  I think he swallowed the anvil afterward, if my memory serves me.  However I will not urge this point.

I have spoken, several times, of the god Lono—­I may as well furnish two or three sentences concerning him.

The idol the natives worshipped for him was a slender, unornamented staff twelve feet long.  Tradition says he was a favorite god on the Island of Hawaii—­a great king who had been deified for meritorious services—­just our own fashion of rewarding heroes, with the difference that we would have made him a Postmaster instead of a god, no doubt.  In an angry moment he slew his wife, a goddess named Kaikilani Aiii.  Remorse of conscience drove him mad, and tradition presents us the singular spectacle of a god traveling “on the shoulder;” for in his gnawing grief he wandered about from place to place boxing and wrestling with all whom he met.  Of course this pastime soon lost its novelty, inasmuch as it must necessarily have been the case that when so powerful a deity sent a frail human opponent “to grass” he never came back any more.  Therefore, he instituted games called makahiki, and ordered that they should be held in his honor, and then sailed for foreign lands on a three-cornered raft, stating that he would return some day—­and that was the last of Lono.  He was never seen any more; his raft got swamped, perhaps.  But the people always expected his return, and thus they were easily led to accept Captain Cook as the restored god.