The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-09-14

wonder there is excitement among the
passengers when, in the dawn OF the
seventh day, they distinguish close at
hand outlines of mountains losing them
selves above in clouds.
With Impotence they wait for day
light. eager to see once more the green
Of living plants 1t is well that their
eagerness does not hasten the impertur-
able course of nature, for the volcanic
cones of the lee coast they are passing,
though striking in outline are nearly
bare of vegetation.
At last as we pass Diamond Head,
with the entrance of the harbor only
three miles ahead, the growing light en-
aJles us to discriminate the deep green
OF the -embowered city, the paler
shades of grass lands and the rudy
brown of the great tufa cone in the
foreground. The fringe of cocoanut
palms. along the Waikiki beach, distin-
guishable even to the naked eye al
though two miles distant, tells US that
we are in the tropics. Otherwise, while
| the verdure delights the starved eye as
verdure, there is nothing in its sugges-
tive of tropical luxuriance. Indeed, I'M
| less there have been copious rains, the
country will strike one as rather parch-
| ed
A botanist, new to the tropics, will be
eager to make closer acquaintance with
the vegetation seen thus in mass in the
distance. He tries with his field glass
to make out details as the steamer con-
tinues its course, parallel with the shore,
but at a tantalizing distance, owing to
the coral reef
arrived at the dock he will look in
vain for any green thing. Even the
water will be destitute of the weeds
that would seem to him prizes. He
must content himself with watching the
kanaka boys, clad save for breech
cloth in their bare, brown skins, diving
for the coins that passengers throw into
the water.
At last he is safely slowed in what is
called hack with the agreeable pros
pect of breakfast on shore occupying
a large part of his thoughts, and as he
is wl1irled on through town he catches
g1inpses of unfamiliar trees and shrubs
that make him impatient to form their
closer acquaintance.
The results of his observations in the
next few days he may summarize some
what as follows: The streets of Homo
lulu for the most part are unshaded,
although the city seems like one great
park-the houses, in their spacious
grounds empowered in trees and shrub
berry. Palm trees abound of numerous
palm, always rigidly erect, its head of
comparatively few pinnate fronds sur
mounting the pale co1ored, smooth,
gracefully tapering column of its stem.
Less striking but more beautiful is the
date palm, whose slender, numerous
fronds curve gracefully outward and
whose erect, shaggy, massive trunk IS
symbolic of strength in repose. There
are palms with slender stems not more
than three inches in diameter and
twenty feet high, stocky palms with
immense fronds twice as large and three
times as numerous as those of the royal
palm, the stem two feet or more in dia-
meter and only ten or fifteen feet high
palms with smooth, strictly cylindrical
jointed trunks, looking like gigantic
bamboos, fan palms, feathery palms,
palms with berry-like drupes, palms
with cone-like fruit, palms bearing nuts
small and large, snaked and covered
with a husk. Queen of them all with
its slender, crooked trunks so to 100
feet high, its plume of magnificent,
gracefully waving, yel1or-green fronds
and its generous burden of fruit is the
cocoanut palm. which however, finds the
L ii
enough for its finest development.
One will find in Honolulu very few
plants belonging to the original flora of
the islands. Even the grasses and weeds
are nearly all exotic The few ''indige-
nous trees occasionally planted are
after all not aboriginal, having been
brought from the Polynesian islands
further south by the original settlers.
Very few species peculiar to the Hawai-
ian Islands are to be found anywhere
| except in the forests of the interior.
where such species mostly originated
There are however many species OF lit
toral plants which are widely distributed,
| the seeds, tubers' or stems being trans
ported long distances without injury by
the salt sea water. These, with some
| cosmopolitan ferns, whose spores are
readily carried long distances by wind.
or accidentally adhering to the feathers
or feet of migratory birds, are about the
only truly native plants one will see in
the vicinity of Honolulu Only a few
| of the I35 or more native ferns are com
| monty planted in gardens The one that
Will particularly attract attention is the
| blrdsneSt fern, Neottopteris indus. which
is frequently placed IN the crotch of a
branching tree trunk, its favorite loca-
|