The Hawaiian Archipelago - Six Months Among The Palm Groves, Coral Reefs, And Volcanoes Of The Sandwich Islands By Isabella L. Bird
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Are they the same as Otaheite? Are the natives all
cannibals? What sort of idols do they worship? Are they as pretty
as the other South Sea Islands? Does the king wear clothes? Who do
they belong to? Does any one live on them but the savages? Will
anything grow on them? Are the people very savage?" etc. Their
geographical position is a great difficulty. I saw a gentleman of
very extensive information looking for them on the map in the
neighbourhood of Tristran d'Acunha; and the publishers of a high-
class periodical lately advertised, "Letters from the Sandwich
Islands" as "Letters from the South Sea Islands." In consequence of
these and similar interrogatories, which are not altogether
unreasonable, considering the imperfect teaching of physical
geography, the extent of this planet, the multitude of its
productions, and the enormous number of islands composing Polynesia,
Micronesia, and Melanesia, it is necessary to preface the following
letters with as many preliminary statements as shall serve to make
them intelligible.
The Sandwich Islands do not form one of the South Sea groups, and
have no other connexion with them than certain affinities of race
and language. They constitute the only important group in the vast
North Pacific Ocean, in which they are so advantageously placed as
to be pretty nearly equidistant from California, Mexico, China, and
Japan. They are in the torrid zone, and extend from 18 degrees 50'
to 22 degrees 20' north latitude, and their longitude is from 154
degrees 53' to 160 degrees 15' west from Greenwich. They were
discovered by Captain Cook in 1778. They are twelve in number, but
only eight are inhabited, and these vary in size from Hawaii, which
is 4000 square miles in extent, and 88 miles long by 73 broad, to
Kahoolawe, which is only 11 miles long and 8 broad. Their entire
superficial area is about 6,100 miles. They are to some extent
bounded by barrier reefs of coral, and have few safe harbours.
Their formation is altogether volcanic, and they possess the largest
perpetually active volcano and the largest extinct crater in the
world. They are very mountainous, and two mountain summits on
Hawaii are nearly 14,000 feet in height. Their climate for
salubrity and general equability is reputed the finest on earth. It
is almost absolutely equable, and a man may take his choice between
broiling all the year round on the sea level on the leeward side of
the islands at a temperature of 80 degrees, and enjoying the charms
of a fireside at an altitude where there is frost every night of the
year. There is no sickly season, and there are no diseases of
locality. The trade winds blow for nine months of the year, and on
the windward coasts there is an abundance of rain, and a perennial
luxuriance of vegetation.
The Sandwich Islands are not the same as Otaheite nor as the Fijis,
from which they are distant about 4,000 miles, nor are their people
of the same race.
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