102 DIFFERENT QUALITIES OF WOOD. 



wood ; hala, sweet,) and when young the tree is 

 here of very elegant growth. At Wouhala (island 

 of Oahu) I observed numbers of the young trees, 

 some of which were covered by a profusion of 

 beautiful flowers of a dark-red colour : the flowers, 

 however, are often observed to difl'er in colour on 

 the same tree, and even on the same stalk ; they 

 grow in clusters, some having the corolla ex- 

 ternally of a dark -red colour, and internally of 

 a dull yellow ; others having it entirely of a 

 dark-red, and others again have the corolla 

 partly red and white externally ; the young 

 leaves are of a dark-red colour, and give an 

 elegant appearance to the tree. This was not 

 observed in the species found at the island of 

 Erromanga ; indeed, the species found at the 

 Sandwich Islands had a more handsome ap- 

 pearance in its growth than that at Erromanga. 

 At the Sandwich Islands, two varieties of the 

 wood are observed by the natives, depending, 

 however, only on the age of the tree ; the young 

 or white wood is called lau, keo, keo ; (lau, 

 wood ; keo, keo, white ;) and the red wood, 

 lau, hula, hula ; (lau, wood ; hula, hula, red.) 

 As before stated, the wood, when taken from a 

 young tree, is white, containing but a small 

 quantity of oil ; as the tree increases in growth, 

 the wood becomes of a yellowish colour, and the 



