Kelea: The Surf-Rider, a Romance of Pagan Hawaii (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from Kelea: The Surf-Rider, a Romance of Pagan Hawaii (Classic Reprint)She was brought up in the chief's enclosure, which contained his large grass house and the smaller houses Of his women and servants. These habitations stood on an eminence about a mile and a half from what is now the harbor of Honolulu. A picturesque ravine bounded the enclosure on the south, and even today defies the transforming hand of civilization, the one spot near the modern city that has marks Of its primitive beauty and simplicity. Hedges Of prickly pear in blossom still line the zigzag path from the plateau above. A short turn leads under a mass of rock, Titan piled, dark in the Shadows and covered With trailing vines. It is the sweetest dell in all the region. Wild roses dispute possession of the soil with the brilliant lantana. Broad leaves wave over bunches of ripe bananas. Two grass houses, gray with age, stand on either side Of a stream that rushes noisily over the stones. A Solitary palm, rooted in the rocks, sentinels a pool a little higher up the stream; it is the last remnant of a grove which hung over sparkling Kapena, a bathing place and reservoir of prolific springs on the heights.