The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1889-11-27
HAWAAI'S PROGRESS.
Cultured Boston Approves Our Onward
March.


Cultured Boston Approves Our Onward
March.
BY the favor of a well-known friend of
Hawaii, G. D. Gilman, of the well-known
firm of Gilman Bros. of Boston, the fol-
lowing extract from the Boston Tran
script OF October Goth, anent the new
Hawaiian School Geography, is obtained,
and will be undoubtedly interesting to
readers of the ADVERTISER as an opinion
from the L" Hub of the Universe - on the
advance in the enlightenment of this far
away mid-ocean kingdom. The paper
| quoted from states:
a striking illustration of the fact of
this age of progress, and the part that the
English language is taking in the ad
vance that is being accomplished, is
made manifest in the Hawaiian Geog-
| raphy" that lies before us, printed
under orders of the Hawaiian Board OF
Education, by Messrs. A. S. Barnes &
Co., New York, in the English Ian
guage.
Our readers who are only advanced to
in the not distant past the Sandwich
Islands-as they have been Familiarity
known-Were considered as of the utter
most parts of the earth.
There was a sort of dreary tropic mys-
terry whether the missionary or " the
missing link would be cannibalized or
converted; whether Captain Cook and
his descendants were still being cooked
for the appetites of the children of the
sun; or whether the efforts of the self
denying men and women who had, as it
was said, taking their lives in their
hands, gone forth to preach a new and
better civilizing gospel that would change
the canniba1 to Christian.
Progress, the march of light and truth
westward, have given us one of the most
signal illustrations of a new life, the
vivifying effect of knowledge and the
birth of nation from the savage to civil
lization. The rapid advance of general
intelligence and the controlling influence
of the English tongue is shown in this
new Hawaiian Geography, published in
our language. Within the easy memory
of the writer all the efforts of the mis-
sionary teachers of the islands were di-
rected to the instruction of the native
race in their own language, and all books,
from the A B G Primer, Colburn's
Arithmetic and the geography to the
Bible were all in native.
Here we have beautiful QuartO form
of twenty-six pages, with characteristic
illustrations of the greatest volcanic
crater in the world; of the busy, growing
capital city of Honolulu, with it's Kings
palace; the picturesque bay of Hilo-the
pilgrimage spot of Captain Cooks land
ing, death and monument; the leaplng
waterfalls, of which there is one that has
precipitous fall of twenty hundred feet
into one of the loveliest valleys of this
earth of ours; and the greatest of con-
trasts of life and death in the terrible de-
vastating lava flow, in its track OF many
miles and beside it the tropical vegeta-
ton, bearing the banana plant, the
cocoanut, the bread-fruit, embellished
with maiden-hair ferns and flowing
Creepers.
Finely-engraved colored maps of the
whole group and of the different islands
give the eye some idea of the clay of the
land with it's many little streams run
ming through the fertile valleys.
The English language is now taught In
the Government schools, as it is found
necessary that the children should be
equipped with this important addition In
their education to enable them to COM
pete with the rapid increase of foreign
influence on the islands, and to provide
Athem with knowledge indispensable to
their best development.
The present Administration is doing
all that it is possible to develop the ma
ton in its best aspects. The Board of
Education is composed of some of the
best men in the kingdom, who bring to
their work an enthusiasm born of deep
love for the country and the rising gen
Grafton. Hon. Alatau T. Atkinson, the
inspector-general of schools at Honolulu,
intrusted the supervision of his work on
the book, in its passage through the
press, to Hon. J. Mott Smith, formerly
resident at Honolulu and commits
sioner of the Government to several
national exhibitions, at present resi-
dent of Boston.