The Hawaiian gazette., 1907-11-08
FIRST IMPRESSIONS.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS.
Nature turned dramatist when she
fashioned the harbor of Honolulu. The
charming aspects of the city are wholly
hidden from the newcomer until after
he sets foot on shore. Robert Louis
Stevenson, writing to his friend Sidney
| Colvin in London, asking the keeper
of the prints to come to Samoa, de-
scribed Honolulu as "the first stop to
the left after you leave San Fran
CISCO" A weary twenty-one hundred
miles of water are to be traversed Be
fore the stopping place is reached. The
| China mail boats cover the distance
in six days, but the clearly white
transports of our army require eight
days for the voyage.
Sixteen or eighteen hours before
coming into Honolulu, voyagers see
clearly, if the weather is fine, the two
great mountains of Mauna Kea and
Mauna Loa on the Island of Hawaii,
one hundred and fifty miles away.
Early the following morning the ship
is off Koko Point, and then Diamond
Head, the rugged, volcanic promon-
tory, the great landmark which marks
the entrance to Honolulu harbor.
The first close sight of land is rather
disheartening. The raw, jagged hills
rise precipitously from the sea, show
ing a coppery red beneath the spare,
scrubby verdure which covers them.
The high shores are cleanly and deep
ly cut, with many valleys in which
the sub-tropical vegetation is rank.
Heavy clouds lie over the mountain
tops, and the heads of the valleys are
banked with rain-clouds. The topog-
raphy of Oahu, the first island seen |
closely, gives one \the impression of a |
great rough clenched hand laid palm !
down on the face of the waters, with |
the knuckles spread slightly apart. |
Cocoanut palms, their fronds sharply /
outlined against the sky, and their /
long, slender trunks twisted by battle |
against the northeast trades. give the
necessary tropical note to the picture, /
like the gulls that lend conference
unto pictures of the sea-
THE HAWAIIAN GREETING.
1t is not SO many years ago that
visitors to Honolulu were met outside
the bars by the deep outrigger canoes
SO typical of the Southern Pacific, and
by crews of laughing, chatter
ing natives, propelling their craft with
flashing heartbladed paddles, and dis
ship. Nowadays, big steamers come
up through the narrow, tortuous chan
mel, and are warped into a berth along
side modern dock AS in the West
indies, little brown-skinned naked
boys. meet the ship half a mile from
the dock and cry for money to be
brown overheard for which they may
live
One perfect magic word" has been
given the Hawaiians in the limited
vocabulary they have constructed from
heir alphabet of fourteen letters. This
s the word, aloha. 1t means .1ove,"
greeting" welcome" lit is an honor
nd pleasure to meet you," goodbye"
farewell and God bless you" 1t may
mean any one or all of these things.
t is a fine, useful word. 1t is the
rst word that newcomer learns, and
he last word that he hears from the
'vable- and attractive people who COIN
d it and whose spirit it 50 adequate
Y embodies into ineligible speech. /.
Sharing an honored place with this II
Tord is a practise as old as the history
the islands, and equally gracious,
qually novel, and equally acceptable
D the visiting malihini. This is the
ustom of stringing garlands of flow
RS about the necks of guests on their l.
rival or departure from house or :
Ity. These garlands, called in the
alive tongue leis, are made of bright !
: colored flowers. and are supposed
} be worn until they wfther. 1t is
0 uncommon sight on steamer days
! Honolulu to see grave, steady-going 5
ID men and women going sedately
bout the streets with wreaths about G