which it was decided not to fire on the patriots even if commanded to do so, but this rumor was never verified.

The ship was cleared and guns ready. Boats were lowered and manned, and it seemed as if trouble was inevitable. The women and children were almost frantic with fear, while the husbands, fathers, and brothers took their places in line of battle, pale but firm and determined.

The commander-in-chief, with President Dole and his cabinet, consulted on what was best, and finally reached the following conclusion. They wished above all things to avoid a collision with the United States marines. Colonel Soper knew that the royalists were eager to bring on an engagement between the Americans and the patriots. They would themselves open fire on the marines, to lay the blame on the patriots. He stationed sharpshooters in the top of the capitol building with orders to shoot every royalist who should fire on the marines.

Colonel Soper had fifteen hundred men under arms. It was a dark, rainy day. Express wagons were on the ground in which all the ammunition was loaded. The cannon could either be dragged off or rendered useless by removing the supporting pins. The intentions of the commander-in-chief were kept even from his subordinate officers, who supposed, and many of whom suppose to this day, that they were to fight.

But if the troops had landed, Colonel Soper, with the information he had, intended to retire before them with all the arms and ammunition. All the gates were to be locked with Yale locks so they would have to break them down, and this would detain them for some time. When the ex-queen had been placed in the executive building, the marines having performed their duty would retire, and the patriots could retake the building, capture the queen, and resume business as a republic.

But the people of Honolulu were never in any danger of an attack from the marines of the Philadelphia, for there never was any intention to land them. On the 29th the arrival of President Cleveland's message referring the whole matter to the arbitrament of Congress relieved both the Government and the people from the long strain of apprehension and alarm. The President of the United States knew he had no authority to overthrow the republic of Hawaii. If they had glanced at Article I., Section 8, of the Constitution of the United States, the people would have understood that the President did not dare land troops in Honolulu for a warlike purpose.

CHAPTER XXXI

THE UPRISING OF 1895

AFTER the ineffectual efforts to restore the queen, the republic of the Pacific would, no doubt, have been at peace but for foreign interference. On July 4, 1894, the provisional government was made permanent, and those whose hearts were fixed on annexation determined to abide the result in silence.

The natives were well treated and filled a majority of the offices at the disposal of the chief executive. In this way a great many were won over to the republic. The elective franchise was extended to all Hawaiians who would take the oath of allegiance to the new Government, and particular pains were taken to reconcile the natives to the new order of things.

No punishment would be too severe for the "missionary government," as the patriots are sometimes called, if they had injured the Hawaiian people as has been charged. With all their faults, the Hawaiians are kind-hearted, gentle, affectionate, and hospitable, and any men who would take advantage of their