Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula. Nathaniel Bright Emerson
of a mele-inoa. In the construction of a, eulogy the Hawaiians were not only punctiliously careful to avoid mention of anything susceptible of sinister interpretation, but they were superstitiously sensitive to any such unintentional happening. As already mentioned (p. 27), they believed that the fate compelling power of a word of ill-omen was inevitable. If it did not result in the death of the one eulogized, retributive justice turned the evil influence back on him who uttered it.
32. Lu ka hua. Casts now its seeds. The maile vine (pl. IV), one of the goddess's emblems, casts its seeds, meaning that the goddess gives the pupils skill and inspires them.
33. Mo'o-helaia. A female deity, a kupua, who at death became one of the divinities, au-makua, of the hula. Her name was conferred on the place claimed as her residence, on Mauna-loa, island of Molokai.
34. Ohia-Ku. Full name ohia-ku-makua; a variety of the ohìa, or lehua (pl. XIII), whose wood was used in making temple gods. A rough stem of this tree stood on each side near the hala-pepe. (See pl. III, also pp. 19–20.)
35. Mauna-loa. Said to be the mountain of that name on Molokai, not that on Hawaii.
36. Kaulana-ula. Full form Kaulana-a-ula; the name of a deity belonging to the order, papa, of the hula. Its meaning is explained in the expression ula leo, in the next line.
37. Ula leo. A singing or trilling sound, a tinnitus aurium, a sign that the deity Kaulanaula was making some communication to the one who heard it.
"By the pricking of my thumbs Something wicked this way comes."
38. Naihe. A man of strong character, but not a high chief. He was horn in Kona and resided at Napoopoo. His mother was Ululani, his father Keawe-a-heulu, who was a celebrated general and strategist under Kamehameha I.
39. Mahiehie. A term conferring dignity and distinction.
40. Onaulu-loa. A roller of great length and endurance, one that reaches the shore, in contrast to a Kalcala.
41. Kalai. An archaic word meaning forty.
42. Hooka. A crescent; the name of the second day of the month. The allusion is to the curve (downward) of a large number(kakai) of malo when hung on a line, the usual way of keeping such articles.
43. Malo kai. The ocean is sometimes poetically termed the malo or pa-á of the naked swimmer, or bather. It covers his nakedness.
44. Ka'ika'i. To lead or to carry; a tropical use of the word. The sun is described as leading the board.
45. Hale-pó. In the opinion of the author it is the name of the board. A skilled Hawaiian says it is the name given the surf of a place at Napoopoo, in Kona, Hawaii. The action is not located there, but in Puna, it seems to the author.
46. Kahiki. Tahiti, or any foreign country; a term of grandiloquence.
47. Wakea. A mythical name, coming early in Hawaiian genealogies; here used in exaggeration to show the age of the roller.
48. Ho'ohua. Applied to a roller, one that rolls on and swells higher.
49. Opu'u. Said of a roller that completes its run to shore.
50. Kua-pá. Said of a roller as above that dies at the shore.
51. Maka-kai. The springing-up of the surf after an interval of quiet.
52. Kakála. Rough, heaped up, one wave overriding another, a chop sea.
53. Hiki-au. Said to be the name of a temple.
54. Kuhihewa. Full name Ka-kuhi-hewa, a distinguished king of Oahu.
55. O iu. Meaning that the board dug its nose into the reef or sand.
VI. THE PASSWORD--THE SONG OF ADMISSION
There prevailed among the practitioners of the hula from one end of the group to the other a mutual understanding, amounting almost to a sort of freemasonry, which gave to any member of the guild the right of free entrance at all times to the hall, or halau, where a performance was under way. Admission was conditioned, however, on the utterance of a password at the door. A snatch of song, an oli, denominated mele kahea, or mele wehe puka, was chanted, which, on being recognized by those within, was answered in the same language of hyperbole, and the door was opened.
The verbal accuracy of any mele kahea that may be adduced is at the present day one of the vexed questions among hula authorities, each hula-master being inclined to maintain that the version given by another is incorrect. This remark applies, though in smaller measure, to the whole body of mele, pule, and oli that makes up the songs and liturgy of the hula as well as to the traditions that guided the maestro, or kumu-hula, in the training of his company. The reasons for these differences of opinion and of test, now that there is to be a written text, are explained by the following facts: The devotees and practitioners of the hula were divided into groups that were separated from one another by wide intervals of sea and land. They belonged quite likely to more than one cult, for indeed there were many gods and au-makua to whom they sacrificed and offered prayers. The passwords adopted by one generation or by the group of practitioners on one island might suffer verbal changes in transmission to a later generation or to a remote island.
Again, it should be remembered that the entire body of material forming the repertory of the hula--pule, mele, and oli--was intrusted to the keeping of the memory, without the aid of letters or, so far as known, of any mnemonic device; and the human mind, even under the most athletic discipline, is at best an imperfect conservator of literary form. The result was what might be expected: as the imagination and emotions of the minstrel warmed under the inspiration of his trust, glosses and amendments crept in. These, however, caused but slight variations