The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1869-07-03

though his portfolio may have been enriched Wit
the rarcst harmonies of tint, new suggestions an
novelties of form, during his sojourn among th
mountains and parks OF Colorado, or in the dee
canyons of the Sierra, yet he must not close
feeling that he has exhausted the revelations tina
this western world has to make to him., until h
has added a few sketches at least of the yet NOR
unique scenery of the Hawaiian Islands. So, i
time permits, let us see the almost possibilitie
and varieties of the Republic. and devote to thesa
at least a couple of months.
This little group of breezy, sunny islands
standing like an outpost of the great army o
islands, little and big, that guards the eastern
coast of Asia, yet offering itself as 4 kind o.
neutral ground on which the eastern and western
worlds have met and joined hands. lies about two
thousand miles southwest of San Francisco, and il
brought into close communication with 1t by
means of a seInimonthly steamer. A voyage OF
ten days,-days of uninterrupted sunshine and
serenity on this most smiling of seas,-and the
passenger will find himself rounding the bold,
bare headland of Diamond Point, which stands
guard over the little bay and city of Honolulu.
The first view of this miniature capital of a petty
kingdom can hardly fail to be Disappointing it
is but a village of unpretending, wooden houses.
clustered for the most part around the bay, and
stretching out, here and there, toward the hills.
But you have not come so many thousand miles
from home TO see a counterpart of Boston or New
York, and the first walk ON shore will offer a
cuSScetlOu at tds OF the pletSure CQaC awaits
you IN the thousand novel shapes and aspects of
a changed hemisphere. After two or three weeks
here,@spent in early morning or evening gallons
into the wonderful valleys of the range of hills
that cuts the island in two, and in climbs to the
different SUBMITS, from which, on each side of
you, the little island seems to roll away and leap
and tumble in great pillows of green into the
sea; with the days rounded in on cool and fra
grant verandas, among these intelligent, hospita-
BILE people, with whom kindness to the stranger
Is the first of duties,-one will find it hard to
believe that the other islands can promise greater
attractions.
The first expedition usually made is to the
active volcano Kilauea, situated on the island of
Hawaii, the eastern-most of the group. The
Indispensable articles by way of outfit for this
are a waterproof "a lady should carry a bloomer
dress OF heavy wooden materially and a saddle, as
all the Journeyings must be made on horseback
to these may be added whatever articles of COM
fort or convenience the Individual taste may sug-
gest but it is desirable that all should not exceed
the capacity of Il pair of saddle-bags. To sail
direct to Hilo, which is the most common course,
instead of landing at Kawaihae, on the other side
OF Hawaii and making n partial circuit of the
island, is to rob ones self of an experience full of
novel enjoyment. 1t is q journey OF three or four
and attended with some fatigue and discom-
but TO the enthusiastic sight-seer the annoy-
ances will be counterbalanced by the pleasures.
After a day of monotonous scenery, the
road winds round the base of Mauna Kea, and
out close to the sea. Then begins the
part of it,-a succession of precipices,
DR. great crevices as they might be called, from
one hundred to five hundred feet deep. But these
oahs, as the natives call them, are as beautiful
rs they are perilous of descent their steep sides
Ire covered with every shade of green, from the
kukm to the dark purple fronds of
he puiu fern,-masses and tangles of vines and
rees,-and at the bottom of each is a roaring,
brook Or narrow orm Of tho a n- :
his side OF the island, also, lie the rich sugar
under the hospitable roofs of whose
'wners the traveller must look to find his shelter
nd his ~victual.
But Hilo will not suffer him to pass her by
Without stopping to pay a tribute of admiration
her beautiful bay and cultivated and generous
giving him at the same time the
pportunity to take breath before the last day
t his journey. The crater of Kilauea opens at a
eight of four thousand feet on the side of the lofty
Loa, and a gradual ascent of thirty miles
'nds you suddenly on the edge of this enormous,
awning chasm. So vast is it that it is impossible
} get any idea of its gigantic proportions till you
ave clambered down its almost perpendicular
alls, and crossed the interior, which measures
IN miles round. Its condition varies greatly at
ltferent times sometimes the molten mass forms ]
chain of fiery lakes. connected by subterraneous
lanneis, sometimes it ovcrleaps its barriers, and :
pods the floor OF the crater with fire. No words =.
N depict the awful fascination of those fery .
ldrons, boiling and kissing and roaring, and !
ssing up fountains of liquid flame. The most C
fective time to see them is the evening. Then
&c whole sky is lighted up with the reflection of I
hre, and the surrounding darkness serves to C
tighten the splendor of the glowing, seething I
ass. L
In striking contrast with Kilauea stands the q
npenduous extinct volcano of Haleakala, almost o
C greater wonder of the two. 1t occupies the =
stern half of the Island of Maui, and is a cone Il
thousand feet high. Its crater is three times +
large as kilauea,-that is, it is thirty miles i'm C
and more than a thousand feet il
ep. Parties visiting this crater are accustomed e
take their camping equipage, and to pass a a
5ht on the top of the mountain, not ONLY be- e
use the excursion would be too fatiguins for a D.
day, but also because through the day the re
'ter is filled with light clouds and mist, which IL
depart with the setting sun. No scene could p
sslbly combine more elements of the grand and G
beautiful than this does the soft, focculent r,
sses of clouds silently rolling in and out of W
se Tartarean depths, through the great gap in ell
mountaln-wall, toward the sea, occasionally sc
saking to reveal the frightfnl blackness beneath: Il
sun as it sinks, touches the whole cloud-land- p
pc with a rose-gay glow long lines of trade q
I'd cloudlets, like fleets of phantom ships. 90 &C =
dding over the sea the three lofty SUBMITS of q.
waii, and the lesser heights of the islands r.,
rounding Maui reflect the sunset tints, and
whole seems like q scene of ~enchantment. or
III Sth aioo DOdst u Il valley tnaC deserves TO w
by the side of the Yosemite, though mi
lifferent in outline and in coloring as to allow
no comparison and this together with the ad
t picturesque mountain group of all the
nds, the richest sugar plantations, and the MI
{ generous and free-handed proprietors, make sp
II the greenest spot in the memory of every Al
eler. re:
is impossible, in the limits of such a brief TO
oh as this, to do more than roughly outline aS
chief points of interest in these tar-off islands. of
climate, too, lends its subtle attraction, a to,
ciously blended heat and GOODNESS in which
are puzzled to know whether you are COM ba
IDLY warm or pleasantly refreshed. One who be
two or three months Of leisure cannot better
ow 1t than in going to see all this for himself, Ar
he Will obtain from the warm-hearted island Vo,
every possible help and suggestion he may P;,,
to make his journey easy and profitable, y,
but only one drawback, namely, that at the
place he may stop, with the exception of VIII
olulu, he must accept the freely offered hos Coz
lty OF the foreign residents, nor dare to make ani
return except in friendships coin. icy
Gre