"Are you from Kanaloa?" asked Kane-milo-hai. That meant are you from Lana'i, Kanaloa being the name formerly given to that little island.
"Aye, I am from Kanaloa and in pursuit of a strange shadowy thing that flits through the ocean and evades me."
"You don't seem to recognize that it is only a shadow, a reflection. The real body is in the heavens. What you are pursuing is but the other intangible body, which is represented by the body of Kane-mano. He is speeding to reach his home in Ohe-ana" (a cave in the deep sea, in the Kai-popolohua-a-Kane).
"How then shall I overtake him?" asked Kane-pua.
"You will never succeed this way. You are no better off than a kolea (plover) that nods, moving its head up and down (kunou). Your only way is to return with me and start from the bread-fruit tree of Lei-walo (Ka ulu o Lei-walo). You must make your start with a flying leap from the topmost branch of that tree. In that way you can come up to him and catch him."
The rest of the story: how he followed the advice given him by Kane-milo-hai and succeeded is too long for insertion here.
[419] Nowai he wa'a? To speak of a lava flow as a wa'a, a canoe, is a familiar trope in Hawaiian mele. (See U. L. of H., p. 194). The canoe in this case is the eruption of fire sent against Lohiau, the hoapaio, against whom it is launched, Lohiau and Hiiaka.
[420] Aimoku wahine. An aimoku is one who eats up the land, a conqueror, a literal description of Pele.
[421] Kini maka o ka la. In the original text from which this is taken the form is Kini-maka, offering the presumption that it is intended as a proper name. Kini-maka was a malevolent kupua, demigod, against whom, it is charged that she was given to scooping out and eating the eyes of men and her fellow gods. Her name was then called Walewale-o-Ku. Kane, it is said, took her in hand and weaned her from her bad practice; after which she was called Kini-maka, Forty-thousand-eyes. The phrase o ka la affixed to her name discountenances the idea that she is the one here intended. It becomes evident that the whole expression means rather the many eyes of the Sun, i.e., the many rays that dart from the Sun; and this is the way I construe it.
[422] Pau o ka wahine? The question as to the kind of pau, skirt, worn by the women--those of Pele's fire-brigade, as I have termed them--is pertinent, from the fact that the answer will throw light on their mood and the character of their errand, whether peaceful, warlike, etc. The answer given in the text (line 20 of the translation) is Their skirts were fern and leaf of the ti. A pau of fern was said to be hanohano, dignified. Ua kapa ia ka palai he palai alii; o ka la-i, ua kapa ia he mea kala (the pau of fern was worn by chiefs; the pau of ti leaf was a sign of propitiation.) A woman wore a ti leaf during her period of monthly infirmity. The whole subject will bear further investigation.