he went about with her and seemed very fond of her, yet he failed to bring matters to a head, and Jean was consequently anxious and impatient. Her mother says that she was desperately nervous and unhappy during that period, and never seemed to have a moment of rest from the distress of uncertainty, but was always on tiptoe with excitement, and either on the top of the wave with joy when David had shown some bit of feeling, or in the depths of despair when he had been indifferent or had failed to come to see her for a day or so.
"And then at last, by some means, she managed to bring him down to a discussion of the situation, and David was frank. He said that he cared for her more than for any other girl that he had ever known; that if he would let himself, he would love her desperately;—but that he was not going to let himself. And the reason was that he wanted to keep Hawaiian blood in his descendants. He loved his race. It was dying out, being attenuated by intermarriage with aliens. He was half white, to be sure; but if he married a white woman, his children would be only one-fourth Hawaiian, and he wouldn't have it that way. His mind was made up to marry a Hawaiian girl, or at least one who was not more than half white;—but an all white girl—no, absolutely! Not even though he loved her to distraction! He simply would not do it, and that was that.
