37 



Dampier and Cook both called attention to the tree as a source 

 of food, and the latter recommended its transportation to the 

 West Indian colonies. In 1787 Lieut. William Bligh was put in 

 command of the Bounty, and commissioned to move a cargo of 

 young trees from Tahiti to the West Indies. After the cargo 

 had been secured and the vessel was on the return trip, a mutiny 

 broke out, and Bligh and a portion of the crew were turned adrift 

 in a small boat. The mutineers returned to Tahiti, from whence 

 a number of them, with a few native men and women, sailed to 

 Pitcairn Island, and established a remarkable colony there. 

 Almost miraculously Bligh did not perish, but reached England, 

 and was again commissioned to undertake the transplanting, 

 which he successfully accomplished in 1792-93. 



According to an ancient Hawaiian tradition the Ulu was intro- 

 duced during that remote period of native history in which there 

 was frequent intercourse with the homeland, " Ka-hiki,'^ in the 

 South Pacific. This was probably Samoa, rather than Tahiti. 

 It is interesting to picture the remarkable canoe-voyages of the 

 primitive Hawaiians back and forth across the vast stretches of 

 the Pacific. As Lydgate states: "The successful introduction, 

 perhaps acclimatization even, must have meant repeated voyages, 

 extending over generations, or even centuries. And not time 

 alone, but patience and skill must have been required for the suc- 

 cessful introduction of a seedless tree like the breadfruit. Under 

 favorable conditions it is not easy to propagate; exposed to the 

 trying vicissitudes of a long canoe voyage; weeks of wind and 

 weather and open sea; lack of water, burning sun and blighting 

 spray, huddled into the bottom of the shallow canoe— how many, 

 many failures there must have been!" 



The voyagers, according to the legend, landed at Ewa, Oahu, 

 and carried the precious young plants across the Ko'o-lau 

 Mountains, to the Kualoa district. Here they were carefully 

 planted and tended, probably under a heavy tabu. At the time 

 of the coming of the first European explorers the breadfruit was 

 plentiful around the native settlements and villages on all the 

 islands; more plentiful than it has been at any subsequent period. 

 It thrived in the humid regions of Kona and Hilo, on the island 



