GEOLOGY AND TOPOGRAPHY OF HAWAII. 99 



liave been a stately island, like those of the inhabited group with which we are 

 familiar, that through submergence and erosion, has been reduced almost to sea- 

 level. 



CHAPTER IX. 

 THE INHABITED ISLANDS: A DESCRIPTION OF KAUAI AND NIIHAU. 



H.vwAii-NEi : Position of the Inh.vbited Islands. 



Tile wonderful group (if liigli, inliii1)ited, volciinic islands over the forma- 

 tion, or at least the completion, of which the Hawaiians believed Pele presided, 

 consists of the islands of Hawaii, Kahoolawe, IMaui, Lanai, iMolokai. Oahu, Kauai 

 and Niihau, together with several smaller islands scattered abtiut them. Taken 

 collectively they form the Hawaiian group as it is generally understood, or as 

 the natives expressed it, "Hawaii-nei," meaning all Hawaii. They are an- 

 chored far out in the middle of the north Pacitic, under the Tropic of Cancer, and 

 extend in a northwesterly direction from Hawaii, the southern most, to Niihau, 

 a distance of about 400 miles. Honolulu, the capital and principal port of 

 the Territory of Hawaii, is located on Oahu. The ]i(isition nf the Territorial 

 observatory in the capitol grounds in Honolulu is in W. long. 157'' 18' 0" 

 and N. lat. 21° 18' 02", and is at a point about fifty miles north and west of the 

 geographical center of the inhabited group. 



Like most volcanic islands, the Hawaiian Islands lie in a iiKire ov less 

 straight line; or to be more exact, in two nearly parallel lines, and are sup- 

 posed by some to be superimposed over a great crack in the ocean's fioor, and 

 by others to rise from a submerged plateau. 



Looking more broadly at the group in its relation to the rest of the W(u-Id. 

 we find the islands situated at the cross-roads of the Pacific Ocean. 2100 miles 

 southwest from San Francisco and eleven days' journey by the fastest train and 

 ship, from New York. They are planted far out in the deep blue waters of the 

 Pacific and are the most isolated islands in the world. It is twelve to eighteen 

 thousand feet down to the ocean's floor on all sides of the group, and, as has 

 already been said, it is believed that all of Ihe islands are the exposed sum- 

 mits of gigantic mountains that rise more or less abruptly from the very bed 

 of the Pacific Ocean. 



This chain of fantastically sculptured volcanic mountain peaks, is made up 

 of fifteen great craters, of the first magnitude, all of which at one time or another 

 have been active. All but three of them, however, have been dead and extinct 

 for centuries, perhaps thousands of centuries. Fortunately all three of the 

 active volcanoes are located on Hawaii, the scuithernmost, and undoubtedly the 

 youngest island of the group. 



Since Honolulu is ordinarily the point of arrival and departure for trans- 

 Pacific steamers, as well as inter-island boats, it is well to make it the center 



