HOLIDAYS IN HAWAII 



other to the other. This is a feature of a new coun- 

 try geologically; the rains and other agents of ero- 

 sion have whittled the mountains to sharp edges, 

 but have not yet rounded or leveled them. 



The northeast trade winds which blow upon these 

 islands nine months in the year bring a burden of 

 moisture from the Pacific which is condensed into 

 rain and mist by the mountains, and which, with 

 the rank vegetation that it fosters, carves them and 

 sharpens them like a great grindstone revolving 

 against their sides. At a place called the Pali — 

 and at the Needles, on the island of Maui — it has 

 worn through the mountain-chain and made deep 

 and very picturesque gorges where, in the case of 

 the Pali, the wind is so strong and steady that you 

 can almost lie down upon it. 



It was near the Pali that I saw what I had never 

 seen or heard of before — a waterfall reversed, go- 

 ing up instead of down. It suggested Stockton's 

 story of negative gravity. A small brook comes 

 down off the mountain and attempts to make the 

 leap down a high precipice; but the winds catch it 

 and carry it straight up in the air like smoke. It is 

 translated; it becomes a mere wraith hovering above 

 the beetling crag. Night and day this goes on, the 

 wind snatching from the mountains in this sum- 

 mary way the water it has brought them. 



On the walk with the Governor we made the ac- 

 quaintance of some of the land shells for which these 



1^29 



