We had an abundance of fruit in Honolulu, of course.  Oranges, pine-apples, bananas, strawberries, lemons, limes, mangoes, guavas, melons, and a rare and curious luxury called the chirimoya, which is deliciousness itself.  Then there is the tamarind.  I thought tamarinds were made to eat, but that was probably not the idea.  I ate several, and it seemed to me that they were rather sour that year.  They pursed up my lips, till they resembled the stem-end of a tomato, and I had to take my sustenance through a quill for twenty-four hours.

They sharpened my teeth till I could have shaved with them, and gave them a “wire edge” that I was afraid would stay; but a citizen said “no, it will come off when the enamel does”—­which was comforting, at any rate.  I found, afterward, that only strangers eat tamarinds—­but they only eat them once.

CHAPTER LXIV.

In my diary of our third day in Honolulu, I find this: 

I am probably the most sensitive man in Hawaii to-night—­especially about sitting down in the presence of my betters.  I have ridden fifteen or twenty miles on horse-back since 5 P.M. and to tell the honest truth, I have a delicacy about sitting down at all.

An excursion to Diamond Head and the King’s Coacoanut Grove was planned to-day—­time, 4:30 P.M.—­the party to consist of half a dozen gentlemen and three ladies.  They all started at the appointed hour except myself.  I was at the Government prison, (with Captain Fish and another whaleship-skipper, Captain Phillips,) and got so interested in its examination that I did not notice how quickly the time was passing.  Somebody remarked that it was twenty minutes past five o’clock, and that woke me up.  It was a fortunate circumstance that Captain Phillips was along with his “turn out,” as he calls a top-buggy that Captain Cook brought here in 1778, and a horse that was here when Captain Cook came.  Captain Phillips takes a just pride in his driving and in the speed of his horse, and to his passion for displaying them I owe it that we were only sixteen minutes coming from the prison to the American Hotel—­a distance which has been estimated to be over half a mile.  But it took some fearful driving.  The Captain’s whip came down fast, and the blows started so much dust out of the horse’s hide that during the last half of the journey we rode through an impenetrable fog, and ran by a pocket compass in the hands of Captain Fish, a whaler of twenty-six years experience, who sat there through the perilous voyage as self-possessed as if he had been on the euchre-deck of his own ship, and calmly said, “Port your helm—­port,” from time to time, and “Hold her a little free —­steady—­so—­so,” and “Luff—­hard down to starboard!” and never once lost his presence of mind or betrayed the least anxiety by voice or manner.  When we came to anchor at last, and Captain Phillips looked at his watch and said, “Sixteen minutes—­I told you it was in her! that’s over three miles an hour!” I could see he felt entitled to a compliment, and so I said I had never seen lightning go like that horse.  And I never had.