Evening star., 1895-11-01
PEARL OF THE PACIFIC
Beauty Of the outrageous, Wave
washed City Of Honolulu.
WHAT THE ALGAROBA TREE HAS Done
Remnant of the Trials ofConspiring
Malcontents.
LSE RUMORS CURRENT

Special Correspondence of The Evening Star
HONOLULU, October II. 1895.
1t being now more than fortnight since
the last strasgling case of cholera appear
ed. we seem justified in counting the city
clean. 1t is indeed month since all but
three scattering cases existed. We can
claim Honolulu no longer to be an infected
port, and can reasonably expect that none
of our regular steamers will in the future
give us the go by, refusing to carry our
mails. has six times been done, for fear
of being quarantined upon arrival at San
Francisco or Sydney. On the last occasion
the China, from Yokohama, on October Z
notified us that no mail would be taken,
but that he wished to land $50 Chinese la
horers, and 200 tons Of freight all from
more less infected Chinese ports. The
board of health made such landing con-
dtional upon his carrying our mails. The
captain succumbed. That was five days
afte: our latest case of cholera, and nine
teen days after the epidemic had ended.
The celestials have since undergone
short quarantine, and have mostly been
shipped off to the plantations expecting
them The Chinese immigrants are gener-
ally peaceable, but on this occasion kept
up a violent disturbance for several days,
quarrelng with the Chinese agents in
charge of them, SO that the superintendent
of the quarantine was compelled to tele-
phone for force of police, who speedily
quieted them by their mere presence.
This quarantine ground is sand spit of
some thirty acres, half mile west of the
harbor channel, and the same distance
! from the shore. 1t is surrounded by reef
and shoal water. the breakers raging half
a mile seaward. The islet contains long
| ranges Of buildings. There is quite an
area Of laWn-Bermuda grass, or man
| ienie"-with many algaroba and iron wood
| trees. all which greenery Is due to a supply
| CT fresh water from the government pipes.
These two kinds of trees in fact, need lit
| tie moisture, and will flourish in pure shell
sand. and close to The sea- Our now beau
tiful Kapiolani Park near diamond Head
was reclaimed from a white barren sard
desert, by the use of these two trees, of
which charming forest now covers much
| OF the thousand acres of ground.
A Useful Tree.
| The algaroba tree has proved a great
boon to these islands. 1t grows almost
anywhere below 500 feet altitude. 1t needs
next to no moisture, sending down indeh-
mite lengths of fbrous roots. Vast tracts
| of formerly treeless lava rocks along the
| dry leeward shores on sll the islands are
| now beginning to be covered with a must
| outrageous shade of these hardy trees.
whose perpetually brilliant green forms a
| strange contrast to the brown verdure-
| less aridity around them. Firewood. which
| twenty yetrs ago could be obtained only
| far up in the mountains. or from remote
| out districts. is row bee Comfng abundant
| and cheap, from extensive forests of al
| garoba growing up either side Of the
city. as well as within its limits. 1t yields
| no timber, being crooked and brittle.
| The algaroba also aids in pasturage. 1t
yields in great abundance a small white
pod filled with coarse, dry. sweetish
| pulp of fich Ecrses and cattle are ex-
ceedingly fond. and which is nourishing
l md foff tpO Tha rio do.
| fourishes under this tree. as 1t rarely does
under any other. The foliage is that of
| the acacia, finely subdivided pinnate leaf.
| which disappears between grass leaves,
instead of burying them. Twenty miles out
| on the Oahu railway. beyond and below
Eva MILL is a tract Of some 10000 acres
of rugged coral plain. where was formerly
| little vegetation. Now a thousand cattle
| fatten there upon the algaroba pods and
the manienie, which fourishes at the base
of the trees. The owner of the land, old
| Jim Campbell did a wise thing fifteen
years ago when he planted young alga-
| robas one or two hundred to the square
mile. Throughout the tract. Their seed is
| rapidly scattered by the animals. which
considerable from the freight of the fire
wood to the city.
| There is some Scrirtural romance about
the name of this tree. which links itself
| with the story of the Prcdigs.l Son. 1t is q
| false kharob from South America, which
derived its name 'alkharob'' from the
| true carob tree of the Levant, which yields
| large pods SO sweet as to to be an article
| of commerce. from which much treacle
| is manufacture ed in Englar d. These true
Kharob pods are identical with the "husks
| which the swine did eat" with which the
prodigal would "fain have filled his
| belly" Our false kharob or algaroba yields
| a pod having too much acrid coarse
| ness for human diet, except in extreme
| starvation. One often sees bags of these
pods at horse stalls. gathered from the
| numberless trees throughout the city. Two
| thirds of the verdure visible on the shore
| from ships approaching the harbor is that
| of the algarobas.