The Hawaiian Archipelago - Six Months Among The Palm Groves, Coral Reefs, And Volcanoes Of The Sandwich Islands By Isabella L. Bird
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I landed in Kealakakua Bay on a black lava block, on which tradition
says that Captain Cook fell, struck with his death-wound, a century
ago. The morning sun was flaming above the walls of lava 1,000 feet
in height which curve round the dark bay, the green deep water
rolled shorewards in lazy undulations, canoes piled full of
pineapples poised themselves on the swell, ancient cocopalms glassed
themselves in still waters - it was hot, silent, tropical.
The disturbance which made the bay famous is known to every
schoolboy; how the great explorer, long supposed by the natives to
be their vanished god Lono, betrayed his earthly lineage by groaning
when he was wounded, and was then dispatched outright. A cocoanut
stump, faced by a sheet of copper recording the circumstance, is the
great circumnavigator's monument. A few miles beyond, is the
enclosure of Haunaunau, the City of Refuge for western Hawaii. In
this district there is a lava road ascribed to Umi, a legendary
king, who is said to have lived 500 years ago. It is very perfect,
well defined on both sides with kerb-stones, and greatly resembles
the chariot ways in Pompeii. Near it are several structures formed
of four stones, three being set upright, and the fourth forming the
roof. In a northerly direction is the place where Liholiho, the
king who died in England, excited by drink and the persuasions of
Kaahumanu, broke tabu, and made an end of the superstitions of
heathenism.
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