property of the chiefs. They are the old "lands." But when the kuliana law
was made, the common people were allowed to take out for themselves such
small holdings as they held in actual cultivation. These kulianas they
still hold; and thus it often happens that within the bounds of a large
estate fifty or sixty families will live on their little freeholds;
and these form a natural and cheap laboring force for the plantation or
rancho.

On the Island of Niihau, I was told, there are still about three hundred
native people. The sheep are allowed to run at large on the island, there
being no wild animals to disturb them; at lambing and shearing times the
proprietors hire their native tenants to do the necessary work; and these
people at other times fish, raise water-melons and other fruits, and make
mats which are famous for their fine texture and softness, and sell at
handsome prices even in Honolulu.

Where, as is the case almost universally, the relations between the
stockman and the native people are kindly, there is a reciprocity of good
offices, and a ready service from the people, in return for management and
protection by the great proprietor, which is mutually agreeable, and in
which the proprietor stands in some such relation to the people as the
chief in old times, though of course with not a tithe of the power the
ancient rulers had.

At Kauai you will also see rice growing. This is one of the products which
is rapidly increasing in the Islands. Of rice and paddy, or unhulled rice,
the exports were in 1871, 417,011 pounds of the first, and 867,452 of
the last. In 1872 there were exported 455,121 pounds of rice and 894,382
pounds of paddy.