Note 3 — Chapter XX

Lomilomi, as this process is called, is peculiar to Polynesia, for the Asiatic shampooing is but a rough substitute. In Hawaii it was an art, and as much a necessary rite of hospitality to the fatigued traveller, or even of luxurious pleasure, as the wine cup in Europe. By it, commencing with almost imperceptible pressure, from the softest hands, every part of the body was gradually submitted to gently increasing force, until each muscle was kneaded and each joint stretched and cracked, and the whole frame, with fatigue removed and endowed with fresh vitality, was lulled into slumber or recruited for fresh exercise. The Hawaiian Sybarites had invented a pleasure unknown to the Roman. The latter, to have the greater capacity for gorging at their feasts, were wont to prepare themselves by emetics, but the more ingeniously sensual savage first eat his fill, and then resigned himself into the hands of skilled and meretricious women, who, by their ingenious substitute of artificial action of the muscles for natural exercise, hastened digestion without the trouble of locomotion to the effeminate Hawaiian, and by a most deliciously sense-exciting and restoring process, prepared him for fresh gratification of his appetites. In this respect we need not regret that the refinement of the art has departed from Hawaii, but the voyager who has once experienced it in its genuineness, cannot but prize its virtues.