Wailuku [
Planta Sugar ]
[Plantation ]
Island of Maui, H. I, May 4, 1866.
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4 May 1866 • Island of Maui, Sandwich Islands
(MS: NPV, UCCL 00099)
My Dear Mother & Sister:
11 o’clock at Night.—This is the infernalest darkest country, when the moon don’t shine; I stumbled & fell over my horse’s lariat a minute ago & hurt my leg, & so I must stay here to-night; I [ came went ]to [Ulapalakua ]Plantation (25 miles,) a few days ago, & returned yesterday afternoon, to Mr. Cornwell’s (Waikapu Plantation) & staid all night (it is 2 miles from here) & came here this evening to Mr Peck’s, (Honolulu friends of [mine,), ]& took tea, & we have been playing seven-up & whist (plenty of ladies in his family;) but I only hitched that horse, intending to ride to the further sea-shore, [ a (this ]is a narrow peninsula in the middle of the island), & stay all night at the Waihee Plantation, ‸5 miles from here,‸ but as I said, I couldn’t even see the horse it was so dark when I came out of Mr Peck’s a while ago, & so I fell & hurt my leg.1 I got the same leg hurt [ the other last week]; I said I hadn’t got hold of a spirited horse since I had been on the island, & one of the proprietors loaned me a big, vicious colt; he was altogether too spirited; I went to tighten the cinch before mounting him, when he let out with his left & kicked me across a ten-acre lot. A native rubbed & doctored me so well that I was able to stand on my feet in half an hour. It was then half after 4, & I had an appointment to go 7 miles & get a girl & take her to a pic-nic ‸a card party‸ at 5. If I hadn’t had a considerable weakness for her she might have gone to the devil under the circumstances, but as it was, I went after her. I got even with the colt; it was a very rough road, but I got there at 5 minutes past 5, & then had to quit, my leg hurt me so. ‸She was ready & her horse was saddled, but we didn’t go.‸ But I had a jolly time—played [ a cribbage ]nearly all night. If I were worth even $5,000 I would try to marry that plantation—but as it is, I resign myself to a long & useful bachelordom as cheerfully as I may.
I had a pleasant time of it at Ulupalakua Plantation. It is 3,000 feet above the level of the sea (in plain sight from here, 25 miles;) two pretty & accomplished [girl’s ]in the family & the plantation yields an income of $60,000 a year—chance for some enterprising scrub.2 I have been clattering around among the plantations for 3 weeks, now, & next week I am going to visit the extinct crater of Mount [ Hala Haleakala]—the largest in the world; it is ten miles to the foot of the mountain; it rises 10,000 feet above the valley; the crater is 29 miles in circumference & 1,000 feet deep. Seen from the summit, the city of St Louis would look like a picture in the bottom of it.3
As soon as I get back from Haleakala (pronounced Hally-ekka-lah,) I will sail for Honolulu again & from thence to the Island of Hawaii (pronounced Hah-wy-ye,) to see the greatest active volcano in the world—that of Kilauea (pronounced [Kee-low-way-ah).—]& from thence back to San Francisco—& then, doubtless, to the States. I have been on this trip 2 months, & it will probably be 2 more before I get back to California.
Yrs aff’y
Sam.
Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary
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Previous publication:
L1, 336–338; MTL, 1:104–5, with omissions; MTBus, 85–86, with omissions; MTH, 40–41, brief excerpt.
Provenance:
see McKinney Family Papers, pp. 459–61.
Emendations and textual notes:
Planta Sugar • [‘Sugar’ over ‘Planta’]
Plantation • Plandtation [‘t’ over ‘d’]
came went • [‘went’ over ‘came’]
Ulapalakua • [sic]
mine,), • [close parenthesis over comma]
a (this • [open parenthesis over ‘a’]
the other last week • [‘last week’ over ‘the other’]
a cribbage • [‘c’ over ‘a’]
girl’s • [sic]
Hala Haleakala • Halaeakala [‘e’ over ‘a’]
Kee-low-way-ah).— • [dash over period]