THE HAWAIIAN PEOPLE. 31 



their phildren's children. We know that thr()U<:h thcni in time the Polynesian 

 race came to ocenpy a new land, established the Hawaiian people and built up a 

 crude thoiioh worthy civilization. 



CHAPTER II. 



TRANQUIL ENVIRONMENT OF HAWAII AND ITS EFFECT ON THE 



PEOPLE. 



The Natural Environment. 



Without dwelling further on the remote and uncertain period which had 

 to do with the origin and early migration of the Hawaiian people, it will be 

 fitting to briefly consider the race in connection with their natural environment. 

 It is well within the purpose of this sketch of the natural history of Hawaii 

 to treat of the people as the native inhabitants, and for that reason we shall 

 dwell upon their primitive and interesting native eultiu'e I'ather than their 

 more recent political history. 



In dealing- with the race as a natural people it will be of interest to enu- 

 merate some of the various forces of nature among which they developed for 

 centuries, since without doubt their environment helped to ma]<e the race what 

 it was at the time of its discovery, — a swarthy, care-free, fun-loving, siqier- 

 stitious people, with a culture that, now it has been more fully studiinl by un- 

 biased ethnologists and is l)etter uiulerstood, has at last gained for the ancient 

 Hawaiians, not only the respect, but the admiration of their more highly cultured 

 and fairer skinned brothers. In seeking only to depict their life as it was in 

 the interesting time of their primitive paganism, before Christianity was brought 

 to them, we must leave entirely out of account the story of one of the most re- 

 markable religious and political developments that a race has ever under-gone 

 in the history of the civilized world. 



So capable and receptive was the Hawaiian race that within less than an 

 hundred years the entire population has not only embraced a foreign and ex- 

 ceedingly advanced form of religion, but by its agency transformed their lan- 

 guage, practices, customs, manners, arts and morals to such a degree that today 

 hardly a trace of their former culture remains to indicate the long road which 

 they have traveled in the upward march from a rude rule of might, fear and 

 superstition to the place where their representatives, chosen by ballot, sit on 

 equal terms in legislative assemblages with their one-time patrons and would-be 

 benefactors, and, without fear or favor, creditably discharge the duties of citi- 

 zen.ship in the great American Republic. 



KoNA Weather and Trade Winds. 



One of the most important physical influences that has affected the ]ieiip]e 

 is the climate. Although the Hawaiian Islands lie at the northern edge of the 

 torrifl zone, their climate is semi-tropical rather than tropical, and is several 



