communities. So it came to pass that the years from 1830 to 1840 were years of marked intellectual development as well as of wonderful spiritual change in the mission. No such numbers were ever before or since converted to Christ as during that decade. Never has there been such another period of book-making, especially for schools, as in those ten years. The eagerness of the Hawaiians to learn was met by the readiness of the missionaries to provide books for their instruction in the rudiments of knowledge, and also the elementary principles of the higher departments of learning; geometry and trigonometry in mathematics, universal history, grammar, political economy, moral science, systematic theology . . .
It is not sufficient to give a people or an individual the bare knowledge of important truth. If these truths are to influence the character, they can reach their highest effectiveness only as they become permanent principles of action. To do this, some length of time, and some varied experiences, are absolutely essential. In no other way can these essentials be so well secured as in the Christian "Home School," as in the records of the Mission these Boarding Schools are very frequently called. From the very beginning of the Mission, the Christian home has been held up before the Hawaiian people as the great object to be desired and sought in reorganizing society on these islands. For in the origin and development of Christianity the family rather than the individual has been presented as the unit in all methods of aggressive movement or of permanent growth . . .5
As Dr. Hyde wrote, so he acted. The program of studies, enriched with lectures, chores, socials, excursions, church meetings, and intellectual games, was but a reflection of his early experiences.
Insistent as the demands of the Institute came to be, he found it a necessity to pursue two rather unrelated goals immediately. The first of these had to do with family housing and the second with mastery of the native language.
Transactions by which a lot became available for the Hyde home moved along rapidly as soon as word reached Honolulu that the Hydes were coming. The Benjamin F. Dillinghams deeded a rather large piece of land on Beretania Street near Alapai Street to the Harvey Rexford Hitchcocks February 1. These people in turn deeded the property to Samuel N. Castle and the Rev. Elias Bond as trustees for the American Board June 27. The Hawaiian Board received $2000 from the American Board for construction of the house with $1500 to be raised locally. Dr. Hyde hurried the plans which were ready in mid-July, 1877. ". . . the house is plain, neat, commodious . . . I can assure you that we feel grateful enough for our home. The lot is a very large one, I have smoothed over the surface, kept out the weeds, let the grass cover it, and the lawn and trees make it most restful and attractive to every eye. The house is excessively plain, but the large, light rooms, and their whole arrangement give everyone the impression of a pleasant home . . . "6
In September 1878 construction and furnishing were well enough along that the Hydes could entertain the Rev. Elias Bond of Kohafa, Hawaii island, a substantial contributor to the American Board for salary and other expenses for the new arrivals. Hyde derived much comfort from the new house. ". . . I had the pleasure of entertaining Bro. Bond at dinner at my house. He was delighted with the arrangement and gratified at the economical yet tasteful finish . . . Every visitor is pleased with the plan of the house, and there is no house in Honolulu that surpasses it in economy of expenditure and convenience of arrangement . . . I do the chores myself."
There was a slight defensive tone in the letters. Someone from Honolulu had written that the Hyde home was a bit on the showy side. "So when you hear of the fine Establishment we keep up . . . please remember there is another side to the story. Yankee wit and thrift can 'Keep up appearances' and make a little go a great way. I have written you fully as you requested in regard to this matter . . . "7 He went on to say that Mrs. Hyde managed to do without any help in the kitchen except that paid student help did most of the washing and ironing.
Robert Louis Stevenson also was to arraign the home as a pretentious manse in his Open Letter to the Rev. Dr. Hyde of Honolulu.8
But Hyde needed no defense. The home became almost a public meeting and housing facility. The Social Science Association met there frequently as did the students of the Institute, and countless other individuals and groups came to enjoy the warm hospitality. The Hydes took in the missionaries stopping over from Micronesia, some of them sick, needing weeks and even months of rest and recuperation. The place was home, hospital, and hotel.
The Hydes renovated the buildings in 1892 and comment was made that "Mrs. Hyde's taste has put the rooms into such shape though at a very moderate cost, that a second Robert Louis Stevenson may grow green eyed with envy again at what money cannot do, but a little Yankee ingenuity can, taking material that other people would despise and by attention to the fitness of things, making a toute ensemble that is very charming to every eye . . . "9
One incident of Honolulu living illustrates the intimate annoyances to which people were subjected. "I did not mean to convey the impression that the mosquitoes, which troubled me at the time I wrote you, were a new pest. Far from it. They are the one continued drawback to comfort in rest or in labor every evening, seven times a week. But some evenings they are worse than usual. I found very soon after my arrival here that I must protect myself against them or my evenings and mornings too would all be lost. So I manufactured a canopy for my study table, and under cover of this I can generally defy the innumerable host of hungry and noisy insects. When I moved into the new house I enlarged the canopy and every evg if we wish to have any comfort reading or writing, or talking or listening, the whole family takes shelter within this mosquito-proof . . . "10
Dr. Hyde had not, until his arrival, heard a word spoken in the Hawaiian language. While he had given some thought to acquainting himself with the language, he encountered an urgency not to mere acquaintance but to mastery. That first Sunday morning, as he faced the great audience of natives in Kawaiahao, where he was preaching to the people he had come to serve and where his every phrase had to be translated, he made up his mind he would learn the language.
Said he after a few weeks had passed: "The spoken language is different from the English, making so much of the vowel sounds and paying so little attention to consonants, that it will require much practice to be perfect in it. Its grammatical construction is very simple, but there are a great many particles, expletives like That man there and The fire burned up everything where appropriate use seems more a matter of instinctive propriety than of regulated usage."11
As the summer months passed he gained enough proficiency to attempt teaching oral English to the native students. Few methods can so quickly prepare a person in speaking a foreign language as this and it is quite likely he grew faster in Hawaiian than the new fall term students did in English. He elicited a pat on the back from a fellow minister: "You would have been gratified could you have heard with us Dr. Hyde's address of twelve minutes in Hawaiian without notes to a large audience in Kaumakapili Church last sabbath evening. . . ."12 He was in his eighth month in Hawaii and the Hawaiian language!
He could say in another month that he could "find no difficulty in conducting a recitation in Hawaiian."13 At the end of the school term he proudly described his first annual report; "I wrote out a full report of the Institute (in Hawaiian) for the Ass'n and a similar report (in English) for the Board which I have just read this evening."14
Dr. Hyde spoke of one practice which certainly contributed to his orderly intimate understanding of the language. ". . . I am committing to writing every hint and suggestion I can get in regard to the language, hoping to make easier for others the work of acquiring the tongue."15
Nothing gives a better insight into Hyde's patience and persistence than a shoe-box sized container I recently stumbled upon at the Bishop Museum. It held these minutely pencilled notes of his on the Hawaiian language. Here even a cursory look speaks of a bonanza. Here is an incredible quantity of Hawaiian phrases and words—thousands—organized under numerous headings; name lists of Hawaiian ducks, bananas, fishes, and others; word lists for work, play, hulas, places; colloquial expressions, proverbs. The accumulation represents remarkable source material for the grammarian, the dictionary compiler, and the translator.
"The language," he said, "as spoken sounds to me like the broken speech of one without a palate. There are nice distinctions in