and in every district where the people are much scattered the government
places a physician--a man of skill and character--to whom it gives a
small salary for attending upon the common people, and he is, I believe,
expected to make a tour of his district at stated intervals. Of course he
is allowed to practice besides for pay. The sugar planters also usually
provide medical attendance for their laborers.

The Government maintains a careful guard over the schools. A compulsory
education law obliges parents, under fixed penalties, to send their
children to school; and besides the common or primary schools, there are a
number of academies, most of which receive some help from the Government,
while all are under Government supervision. The census gives the number of
children between six and fifteen years of age at 6931; and there are 324
teachers, or one teacher for every twenty-seven children in the whole
group. Attendance at school is, I suspect, more general here than in any
other country in the world. The last report of W.P. Kamakau, the President
of the Board of Education, made in March, 1872, returns 8287 children
actually attending upon 245 schools of various grades, 202 being common
schools. Under this system there is scarcely a Hawaiian of proper age who
can not both read and write.

Churches they maintain by voluntary effort, and their contributions are
very liberal. They take a pride in such organizations. Dr. Coan's native
church at Hilo contributes $1200 per year to foreign missions.

There are no beggars, and no public paupers except the insane, who are
cared for in an asylum near Honolulu, and the lepers, who are confined
upon a part of Molokai. The convicts and the boys in the reform school
contribute to their own support by their labor. The Queen's Hospital is
only for curable cases, and the people take care of their own infirm, aged