More than two centuries before Columbus reached America on its Atlantic side a Japanese junk visited the western shore. The tradition is too vague to specify whether the navigators attempted a landing or not, but as their boat was small and could not have been provisioned for a voyage of thousands of miles, it is probable that they took on fresh supplies of food and water before they put about and started on the homeward journey. They never saw Japan again, for their vessel went to wreck on Maui, whose king personally rescued five of them,—three men and two women. This was the second appearance in the Hawaiian islands of “white people with shining eyes.” When the captain of the junk reached the shore he still carried the keen sword of steel he had girded on in the expectation of an attack from savages. There was no attack. He and his mates were received with kindness, and provided with houses, although they shocked the multitude by their ignorance of the taboo, the men and women eating from the same dishes. It was explained that their gods were poor, half-enlightened creatures, and that it was as well to let them alone until they should learn truth and manners.

In time these castaways took Mauians to husband and wife, the captain’s sister marrying the king himself, but the captain was held in superstitious reverence because of his sword. The natives had daggers, knives, axes, adzes, hammers, and spears of stone, bone, shark teeth, and fire-hardened wood, but metals were unknown to them, and this long, glittering blade, that cut a javelin stem as the javelin would crack a rib, was a daily wonder. It was the common belief on that island that whoever wielded the weapon would win a victory, though his enemies should be thousands in number. This belief was comforting, but it did not last, for Kalaunui, king of Hawaii, undertook in the year 1260 the subjugation of the whole group, and although his force was defeated with great slaughter on Kauai, he had subdued Maui, Oahu, and Molokai, for the time being, with his fleet of two thousand well-manned, well-armed canoes.

In the great fight on Maui the Japanese warrior fought to the last, but was struck down by a Hawaiian captain, one Kaulu, who buried the precious sword on the spot where he had taken it, and recovered it by starlight. Knowing that the king would demand it if it were seen, he gave it in charge of his mother Waahia, a seer of such renown and verity that she accompanied the army at the request of its leaders. The old woman concealed the blade in the hollow of a rock. Unhappily for her cause, she had not foreseen the result of this campaign, for the expedition met its Waterloo on the shores of Kauai, hundreds of the men being drowned or slain by slings and javelins before a landing could be made. King Kalaunui was made prisoner, the kings of Maui, Oahu, and Molokai, whom he had taken with him as hostages for the surrender of their islands when he should return, were released, and a remnant of the invading force, under lead of Kaulu, returned. The queen was filled with wrath at the failure of this expedition, and rebuked Kaulu for treachery and cowardice,—Kaulu, who had stood by his lord to the moment of his capture, and who had wrested the magic sword from its owner.

Burning under this charge, he sought his mother and asked what he should do to disprove it. She replied that he should not only be cleared by the king himself, but he should marry the king’s daughter. The queen began at once to negotiate for the release of her husband. That monarch was confined in a hut, surrounded by a stone wall and strongly guarded, but was, nevertheless, treated with the respect and distinction worthy of the Napoleon that he was. A fleet of canoes with many spears was offered in exchange; but, with the spoils of battle still in their possession, the victors only smiled at this. Next came an offer of twenty feather cloaks, with stone axes, ivory, and whalebone; but this, too, was rejected. A third proposition by the queen was that the ruler of Kauai should wed her daughter and agree to a perpetual peace. This came to nothing. Several attempts were made to renew the war, but they fell flat, for the experience had been too bitter and the people refused. Three years thus passed,—a time sufficient to convince the queen of her political weakness. She had almost resigned hope when old Waahia sought an audience at court, and said, when she had received permission to break the taboo and speak before the councillors, that she, and she alone, could rescue the king, but she would not undertake this unless the chiefs would promise to grant her request, whatever it might be, on their lord’s return.

This pledge they gave with the understanding that it was not to affect life or sovereignty or possessions, and the seer left for Kauai, with but a single oarsman, in the morning. She arrived while the new-year festivities were in progress, and everybody was in good-humor. There were music, dancing, chanting of poems and traditions, feasting, and much swigging of spirits, not to speak of indulgences that would have shocked civilization. Unannounced, a weird-like, commanding figure, Waahia sought the presence of the court. She had come, she said, to make a final offer for the release of the royal prisoner: the offer of a sword that flashed like fire, that was harder than stone, that broke spears like reeds, that gave to its owner supreme fortune and supreme command. The fame of the bright knife had gone abroad ere this, and an offer had at last been made that carried persuasion with it. The liberty of the king was promised when it should be brought. But first she wished the prisoner’s assurance that on his return he would give his daughter in marriage to her son, since the young people loved each other, and the marriage would also remove the disgrace that the queen had angrily tried to fix upon Kaulu.

This was agreed to, and a few days later the old woman reappeared at the palace with the splendid weapon,—one that would still be splendid, for such blades are not made nowadays,—and with general rejoicing at the possession of this wonder, the chiefs liberated Kalaunui, and he returned to Hawaii, cured of ambition for leadership and military glory. His daughter was married to Kaulu, captain of the royal guard, and kings were their descendants. For many years the glittering prize remained with the ruling house of Kauai, but its virtue had fled when the invincible Kamehameha undertook the conquest of the islands and their union under a single king, for he succeeded in that enterprise, as Kalaunui had not.