Charlotte Mary Yonge (1823 —): An English writer. She is the author of more than one hundred novels and juvenile books, some of which are widely popular. This story is one of the heroic tales retold in her "Book of Golden Deeds." 1. Few regions in the world are more beautiful than the Hawaiian Islands, which lie far away in the Pacific. They are in great part formed by the busy little coral polyps; but in the midst of them are lofty mountains, thrown up by the wonderful power that we call volcanic. 2. In sailing up to the islands the first things that one sees are two lofty peaks, each two miles and a half high. One is white with perpetual snow, the other is dark-dark with lava and cinders on which the inward heat will not permit the snow to cast a white mantle. The first of these has been tranquil for many years, the other is the largest and most terrible active volcano in the world, and is named Kilauea. 3. The huge crater is a lake of liquid fire several miles across. Over it there is always a vapor, which hangs by day like a silvery cloud, but at dusk is red and glowing, and at night is like a forest in flames. Rising into the glowing mist are two black cones, in the midst of a sea of melted lava, tossed wildly about as in a boiling caldron. 4. The edge of this huge basin of burning matter is a ledge of hard lava, above which rises a mighty wall of scoria or cinder; in one place it forms an abrupt precipice four thousand feet high, but in others it can be descended, by dangerous paths, by those who desire to have a closer view of the lake of flame within. 5. Tremendous is the scene at all times, but at the periods of eruption the majesty is beyond all imagination. Rivers of boiling lava, blood-red with heat, rush down the mountain side and spread destruction over the plains. 6. Heathen nations living among such wonderful appearances of nature naturally think they are caused by divine beings, and so in the Hawaiian Islands the terrible Kilauea was supposed to be the home of the goddess Pelé. Fierce goddess she was, who permitted no woman to touch the verge of her mountain, and, if one should do so, it was believed that Pelé, in her wrath, would destroy the whole island. 7. At length, however, missionaries came to the islands, and little by little the people ceased to worship their savage deities, and they began to revere the one true Maker of heaven and earth. But still they did not quite put aside their old belief about Kilauea; there the terrible sights and sounds and the desolating streams that might at any moment burst from the basin of flame were to them signs of the anger of a mighty goddess whom the nation feared to provoke. 8. After the young king and all his court had made up their minds to abandon their idols, still the priests of Pelé on the flaming mountain kept their stronghold of heathenism, and threatened Pelé's wrath upon those who gave up the ancient worship. 9. Then it was that a brave, Christian woman, strong in faith and courage, resolved to defy the goddess and break the spell that bound the trembling people to her worship. The name of this woman was Kapiolani. No common trust and courage were needed to enable her to carry out her undertaking. Not only was she outraging the old religious belief of her people; the ascent of the mountain was very toilsome and dangerous. 10. Wild crags and slippery sheets of lava and slopes of crumbling cinders were difficult for the fect of the coast-bred woman to climb. And the heated soil, the vapor that oozed up from the crevices of the half-cooled lava, must have filled any mind with awe and terror, above all one that had been bred up in the faith that these were the signs of the wrath of a revengeful and powerful deity whose law she was disobeying. 11. A short time before, several men had been suffocated on the mountain side by the gases of the volcano struck dead, as it must have seemed to the islanders, by the breath of the angry goddess. 12. But Kapiolani, strong in the faith that the God in whom she believed would guard her from danger, climbed up the mountain, bearing in her hand the sacred berries which it was considered sacrilege for one of her sex to touch. 13. The angry priests of Pelé tried to bar her way by threatening her with the rage of their mistress; but Kapiolani heeded them not. She made her way to the top of the mountain and gazed into the fiery gulf below, then she descended the side of the terri ble crater, even to the margin of the boiling sea of fire, and hurled into it the sacred berries. 14. "If I perish by the anger of Pelé," she exclaimed, "then dread her power; but, behold, I defy her wrath. I live and am safe, for Jehovah the Almighty is my God. His was the breath that kindled these flames; His is the hand which restrains their fury! Oh, all ye people, behold how vain are the gods of Hawaii and turn and serve the Lord!" 15. Then the brave woman descended the mountain and went in safety to her home. She had won her cause the cause of faith. Ki lau e'ä. Pe'le. Cal'dron: a large kettle. Erup'tion: a violent throwing out of flames, lava, etc., as from a volcano or Věrge: edge. Děs'o lāt ing: laying a fissure in the earth. waste. Kä pï ō lä'ni. De'i ty god. profaning sacred things; impiety. Săc'ri lege: the sin of Kapiolani BY ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON 1. When from the terrors of Nature a people have fashioned and worship a Spirit of Evil, Blest be the voice of the Teacher who calls to them, "Set yourselves free!" |