The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1908-09-02
ALL ABOUT hawaii

Richard G. Sprott, son of w. A.
Sprott, division freight agent of the
Wabash and the Wheeling & Lake Erie
railroads, since he enlisted in Uncle
Sans navy two years ago, has written
some clever letters to his father and
other relatives in Toledo. He is an
observing young man and his descrip-
lions of what he sees while knocking
about the world are interesting and
instructive. Richard is now doing duty
on the United States battleship Louis
lana and his latest letter to his father
bears the Honolulu postmark and date
of July o. The young writer says, in
part:
at was by accident that 1 went
ashore yesterday, but inasmuch as
went it is up to me to tell you that
had a fine liberty and that Honolulu is
beautiful place. l didn't get a chance
to see all the places of interest, as
we only had leave from l p. m. to I
a. m. took car ride out to the ball
park first. 1t is the finest diamond
have ever seen and has the New YORK
polo grounds backed off the Board. Ev-
erybody plays ball out here There is
an island league composed of teams
made up of Japs, Chinese and Hawaii
ans. The American team here is not
leader in the league. The Japs hold
the honors.
All Car service is free, for enlisted
men. l took in the 'Punchbowl,' an
active volcano crater, and walked back
to Waikiki for swim. There is the
place you see the surf riding, for which
the natives here are renowned the
world over. Some ride the surf on
boards about four feet long, and 9th
ers use what is called the out-rigger,
which is a canoe-like boat with a
boom rugged out one side. The swell
starts to break about 400 feet from
the beach and the water from the
beach out about so feet is churned to
a sea of froth. These boats the men
use seem to ride from the crest of one
breaker to the next and the constant
wash of the breakers shoves the boat
along at a tremendous speed, so that
when nearly to the beach they are ira
Yelling at the rate of about forty knots
an hour. 1t is great sport to watch
them.
81 also took in the aquarium. II
has beautiful assortment of deep sea
fishes of rare varieties which l had
never before seen. No painter could
depict one of the butterfly fish. The
fish looks to be about as thick as or
binary wrapping paper, and butterfly
is plain looking thing compared
with the colors of these fish.
Towards evening l went out to the
Hawaiian Pineapple Company's plant
It is known as the largest pineapple
canning factory in the world-they
don't do anything but can pineapple'
there. One of the foremen took ui
around and showed us the whole
works. We filled up on pines. They
eat pineapples here like we eat orang
es. They are large the biggest l eve,
saw. The one the fellow broke TO
us tipped the scales at ten pounds anC
quarter He says it was only al
ordinary sized pine. The capacity o
the plant, was told, was $4,000 pounds
daily. Before we came to this islanC
l used to wish I could sit down to
big bowl of pineapple like mother uset
to make, sliced, with sugar sprinklet
over the top, about three hours in tn,
ice box, you know, but one of thes,
big juicy pines, so ripe that they ar
squashy, are sweet and the fines
things you ever ate.
"A big fight was pulled off in tn
early part of the evening that We tool
in. The champion heavyweight OF tn
fleet and the champion native islande
mixed IL up, but the islander was to-
fat and nearly got killed. There wa
a big farewell ball at the Sea Beacl
Inn for officers and men, where l fin
p ished the evning. The dance floor /
4 built under the trees and palms-n
t roof, but native orchestra music. me
some sweet Kanaka girls and dance