The Hawaiian Archipelago | Page 3

custom houses, a civil list,
taxes, a national debt, and most of the other amenities and appliances of
civilization.
There is no State Church. The majority of the foreigners, as well as of
the natives, are Congregationalists. The missionaries translated the
Bible and other books into Hawaiian, taught the natives to read and
write, gave the princes and nobles a high class education, induced the

king and chiefs to renounce their oppressive feudal rights, with legal
advice framed a constitution which became the law of the land, and
obtained the recognition of the little Polynesian kingdom as a member
of the brotherhood of civilized nations.
With these few remarks I leave the subject of the volume to develop
itself in my letters. They have not had the advantage of revision by any
one familiar with the Sandwich Islands, and mistakes and inaccuracies
may consequently appear, on which, I hope that my Hawaiian friends
will not be very severe. In correcting them, I have availed myself of the
very valuable "History of the Hawaiian Islands," by Mr. Jackson Jarves,
Ellis' "Tour Round Hawaii," Mr. Brigham's valuable monograph on
"The Hawaiian Volcanoes," and sundry reports presented to the
legislature during its present session. I have also to express my
obligations to the Hon. E. Allen, Chief Justice and Chancellor of the
Hawaiian kingdom, Mr. Manley Hopkins, author of "Hawaii," Dr. T. M.
Coan, of New York, Professor W. Alexander, Daniel Smith, Esq., and
other friends at Honolulu, for assistance most kindly rendered.
ISABELLA L. BIRD.

LETTER I.
STEAMER NEVADA, NORTH PACIFIC, January 19.
A white, unwinking, scintillating sun blazed down upon Auckland,
New Zealand. Along the white glaring road from Onehunga, dusty trees
and calla lilies drooped with the heat. Dusty thickets sheltered the
cicada, whose triumphant din grated and rasped through the palpitating
atmosphere. In dusty enclosures, supposed to be gardens, shrivelled
geraniums scattered sparsely alone defied the heat. Flags drooped in the
stifling air. Men on the verge of sunstroke plied their tasks
mechanically, like automatons. Dogs, with flabby and protruding
tongues, hid themselves away under archway shadows. The stones of
the sidewalks and the brick of the houses radiated a furnace heat. All
nature was limp, dusty, groaning, gasping. The day was the climax of a
burning fortnight, of heat, draught, and dust, of baked, cracked, dewless
land, and oily breezeless seas, of glaring days, passing through fierce
fiery sunsets into stifling nights.
I only remained long enough in the capital to observe that it had a look
of having seen better days, and that its business streets had an

American impress, and, taking a boat at a wharf, in whose seams the
pitch was melting, I went off to the steamer Nevada, which was
anchored out in the bay, preferring to spend the night in her than in the
unbearable heat on shore. She belongs to the Webb line, an independent
mail adventure, now dying a natural death, undertaken by the New
Zealand Government, as much probably out of jealousy of Victoria as
anything else. She nearly foundered on her last voyage; her passengers
unanimously signed a protest against her unseaworthy condition. She
was condemned by the Government surveyor, and her mails were sent
to Melbourne. She has, however, been patched up for this trip, and
eight passengers, including myself, have trusted ourselves to her. She is
a huge paddle-steamer, of the old- fashioned American type, deck
above deck, balconies, a pilot-house abaft the foremast, two monstrous
walking beams, and two masts which, possibly in case of need, might
serve as jury masts.
Huge, airy, perfectly comfortable as she is, not a passenger stepped on
board without breathing a more earnest prayer than usual that the
voyage might end propitiously. The very first evening statements were
whispered about to the effect that her state of disrepair is such that she
has not been to her own port for nine months, and has been sailing for
that time without a certificate; that her starboard shaft is partially
fractured, and that to reduce the strain upon it the floats of her starboard
wheel have been shortened five inches, the strain being further reduced
by giving her a decided list to port; that her crank is "bandaged," that
she is leaky; that her mainmast is sprung, and that with only four hours'
steaming many of her boiler tubes, even some of those put in at
Auckland, had already given way. I cannot testify concerning the
mainmast, though it certainly does comport itself like no other
mainmast I ever saw; but the other statements and many more which
might be added, are, I believe, substantially correct. That the caulking
of the deck was in evil case we very soon had proof, for during heavy
rain above, it was a smart shower in the