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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It Is
But A Narrow Strip Of Land Between The Ocean And The Red, Flaring,
Almost Inaccessible, Maui Hills, Which
Here rise abruptly to a
height of 6,000 feet, pinnacled, chasmed, buttressed, and almost
verdureless, except in a few
Deep clefts, green and cool with ferns
and candlenut trees, and moist with falling water. Lahaina looked
intensely tropical in the roseflush of the early morning, a dream of
some bright southern isle, too surely to pass away. The sun blazed
down on shore, ship, and sea, glorifying all things through the
winter day. It was again ecstasy "to dream, and dream" under the
awning, fanned by the light sea-breeze, with the murmur of an
unknown musical tongue in one's ears, and the rich colouring and
graceful grouping of a tropical race around one. We called at
Maaleia, a neck of sandy, scorched, verdureless soil, and at
Ulupalakua, or rather at the furnace seven times heated, which is
the landing of the plantation of that name, on whose breezy slopes
cane refreshes the eye at a height of 2,000 feet above the sea. We
anchored at both places, and with what seemed to me a needless
amount of delay, discharged goods and natives, and natives, mats,
and calabashes were embarked. In addition to the essential mat and
calabash of poi, every native carried some pet, either dog or cat,
which was caressed, sung to, and talked to with extreme tenderness;
but there were hardly any children, and I noticed that where there
were any, the men took charge of them.
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