The stores are closed,
the church-going is very demonstrative, and the pleasure-seeking is
very unobtrusive. The wharves are profoundly quiet.
I went twice to the English Cathedral, and was interested to see
there a lady in a nun's habit, with a number of brown girls, who was
pointed out to me as Sister Bertha, who has been working here
usefully for many years. The ritual is high. I am told that it is
above the desires and the comprehension of most of the island
episcopalians, but the zeal and disinterestedness of Bishop Willis
will, in time, I doubt not, win upon those who prize such qualities.
He called in the afternoon, and took me to his pretty, unpretending
residence up the Nuuanu Valley. He has a training and boarding
school there for native boys, some of whom were at church in the
morning as a surpliced choir. The bishop, his sister, the
schoolmaster, and fourteen boys take their meals together in a
refectory, the boys acting as servitors by turns. There is service
every morning at 6.30 in the private chapel attached to the house,
and also in the cathedral a little later. Early risers, so near the
equator, must get up by candlelight all the year round.
This morning we joined our kind friends from the Nevada for the last
time at breakfast.
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