1893.] A CHINESE FIRE BRIGADE.

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When we expressed our admiration, although she could neither speak nor understand English, the ruling passion was manifest, and she tottered into an outer room and returned with two more pairs which she had just finished, quite as an American or English lady might show her best bonnet to her dearest friend. One pair was scarlet, with birds embroidered in gold thread. The others were yellow. She then pointed with great admiration to a photograph of her mother, an elderly matron of much dignity, who still lives in China. Her husband, who was present throughout the call, also showed us a photograph of himself, in which he wished us to observe that he was arrayed in the attire of a mandarin, which he was entitled to wear. His wife, posed beside him, was also resplendent in garments befitting her rank. I asked the man his opinion of annexation, upon which he talked very intelligently. "I would rather the island belonged to the United States than to Japan," he said, "if the authorities would treat us fairly and protect us, as the Hawaiian authorities always have done. We have nothing to complain of now, and have prospered here under Hawaiian rule." His statement was true.

One merchant, Ah Fong, who married a woman half American and half Hawaiian, has amassed a large fortune, and both he and his family are people of social distinction in Honolulu. He has a family of thirteen daughters and four sons. Four of the

daughters are married to Americans, one of the latter a naval officer, all being intelligent and welleducated girls of charming manners.

There is also in Honolulu a well-equipped and well-disciplined Chinese fire brigade, which raised the fund by subscriptions among their own countrymen exclusively to buy their engines and uniforms and to build their own engine-house. At the

funeral of a member of the Hawaiian Fire Brigade, on the Sunday after my arrival, the Chinese firemen marched in procession, and had evidently never been taught that they were under a race ban in other parts of the world.

CHAPTER XV.

THE QUEEN-DOWAGER.

HORTLY after this visit to the Chinese school,

SHO

Mr. C. A. Brown called and informed me that the Queen-Dowager, Kapiolani, would be pleased to receive me at two o'clock that afternoon. The visit had been arranged upon my arrival; but a number of unforeseen circumstances caused its postponement from week to week. Kapiolani still owned large estates, and was a woman of great wealth. She suffered from rheumatism, which the moist climate seemed to aggravate, and as a consequence lived in comparative retirement. She occupied a villa on the Waikiki Road, between Honolulu and Diamond Head. Opposite the entrance to the grounds was the beach and the sea, with a perpetual dash of the surf against the reef, which could be seen as well as heard through the dense growth of date palms and algaroba trees. The house was approached by a circuitous drive. Over the entrance to the gate was a board with a notice, “Kapu" ("Keep out "). The grounds were planted with date palms, algaroba

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and cocoanut trees; but there is a lack of that care which most estates here receive. I was told that this was in accordance with the old Queen's wish; that she had the labour of a retinue of natives whenever she saw fit to command it, the people still paying their rents in this manner -- a survival of the old feudal system which prevailed under the Kamehamehas. In front of the house was a low edge of ti, the tree whose leaves are used for wrapping up almost every article bought in the market, and which is also wrapped about fish and pork, which the natives roast in the ground.

The villa was characteristica sort of bungalow, the entire front covered with lattice-work, a door leading to the lanai in the rear of the vestibule, over which was a single window. The drawing-room in front, which was lighted by windows in the rear of the apartment only, was approached by a flight of stairs on the outside. In the lower vestibule on the ground floor were two large divans of wood, inlaid with mother-of-pearl - former possessions of King Kalakaua, and evidently souvenirs of his travels in India. As we approached, one of the Queen's ladies came out of an inner apartment, and met us upon the threshold. She ushered us into the drawing-room, and said she would inform the Queen of our arrival. She was a Hawaiian, dressed in a trained holoku of blue-and-white check silk. Before the Queen appeared, I had an opportunity to look

1893.]

THE QUEEN'S APARTMENTS.

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about the drawing-room, which, like all Hawaiian houses, was a combination of American and native taste. There was a set of brown rep furniture, such as was in fashion twenty years ago; over one large armchair was thrown an ahula, made of the feathers of some sort of sea-bird. Upon the floor was a Brussels rug, with a pattern of mammoth red and yellow roses; and upon this, in the very centre of the room, stood a towering kahili, which almost touched the ceiling. This had a wooden handle five feet in length, from which was a spreading base of soft scarlet and yellow feathers, surmounted by a structure composed of the greyish black feathers of a gull. Over the windows were lambrequins of flowered chintz, ornamented with bows and loops of scarlet ribbon; while the doorways were draped with splendid Oriental brocade, scarlet interwoven with gold. There were a great many portraits of King Kalakaua- one in oil, another in crayon, and a fine water-colour. These portraits represented a man of a decided negro type rather than Hawaiian, with thick lips, flat nose, hair less wavy than that of the pure-blooded Hawaiians. A bust in clay stood on an ebony pedestal. There were many vases of flowers standing about-not on tables, as we should have arranged them, but upon the floor: one at the foot of the pedestal which held the bust, one beside the kahili, and another near the armchair. They were oppressively fragrant, gardenia, stephanotis,