xx INTRODUCTION, 
streams spoken of before, although certainly hundreds of years 
old, are quite bare of vegetation and reflect, when seen from a 
distance above, mirror-like the rays of the sun from the smooth 
surface. Yet they are covered with shrub and forest in their 
upper course, as far as this touches the region of clouds, 
The isla of Hawaii, separated from Maui by a strait 
twenty miles in width, is made up of mountain stocks of very 
different ages. The oldest is undoubtedly the most western, the 
Kohala range. It occupies the north angle of the island in a 
direction from northwest to southeast, and rises to a height of 
about 6000 ft. No trace of a crater is left, and the few tufa 
cones on the southwest side are much worn down. On the 
northern extremity it is fringed by the plain of Kohala, the 
only level land with deep soil to be found on the island, and 
eminently adapted to the cultivation of the sugar-cane. The 
windward side is deeply cut into broad valleys which penetrate 
to the core of the mountain and enclose level bottoms with steep, 
often precipitous, walls 1500 to 2000 ft. in height. The valley 
of Waipio has a waterfall of considerable size (1500 ft. high), which 
it is dangerous to approach on account of the stones and rocks 
which are frequently detached and hurled down by the force of 
the water. The dividing ridges fall off in precipitous cliffs toward 
the sea. Intercommunication between these valleys otherwise 
than by canoe is exceedingly difficult, in some cases impossible, 
and the people living in them are as much cut off from the 
rest of the world as those in the valleys of Pelekunu and Wailau 
on the north side of Molokai. The valleys are all noted for the 
abundance of taro raised. The basalt of this range is more com- 
pact, heavier, and blacker than that of any other formation of 
the Islands, ‘and the preponderance of iron is indicated by the 
strongly magnetic property of the black sand carried to the sea 
by the stream 
Next in = comes Mauna Kea, the highest mountain of the 
whole group (13,805 ft.). It is an extinct voleano without central 
crater, and has an almost unbroken mantle of eroded rock in its 
upper half, here and there covered with argillaceous soil. Bare lava 
streams appear only near the broad top, which is generally wrapt 
in clouds and is crowned by seven cones of 600 to 1000 ft. 
height, built up of lapilli and tufa. The small crater of one of 
these cones is usually filled with water. In its lower half the 
windward side of the mountain is furrowed by a great number 
of more or less deep, narrow gulches, each carrying a copious 
