Page:Hawaii's Story by Hawaii's Queen.pdf/341

At two o’clock on the afternoon of the 27th of February I was again called into court, and sentence passed upon me. It was the extreme penalty for “misprision of treason,”—a fine of $5,000, and imprisonment at hard labor for five years. I need not add that it was never executed, and that it was probably no part of the intention of the government to execute it, except, perhaps, in some future contingency. Its sole present purpose was to terrorize the native people and to humiliate me. After Major Potter had read to me my sentence, and carefully pocketed the paper on which it was written, together with the other papers in the case (I might have valued them, perhaps, as souvenirs), I was conducted back to my place of confinement.

No especial change was perceptible in my treatment or mode of life by reason of my trial and sentence. Though I was still not allowed to have newspapers or general literature to read, writing-paper and lead-pencils were not denied; and I was thereby able to write music, after drawing for myself the lines of the staff. At first I had no instrument, and had to transcribe the notes by voice alone; but I found, notwithstanding disadvantages, great consolation in composing, and transcribed a