40 GEOGRAPHY OF THE SANDWICH ISLANDS. 



and populous as Mowee, and perhaps the most valuable of all the islands, 

 agriculturally and commercially; and eighty miles farther west are the 

 large island of Atooi, (Kauai,) and the smaller ones of Oneehow, (Ni- 

 hau,) and Tahoora, (Kaula,) which complete the number of the group. 



The islands are all mountainous and volcanic. On Owyhee are three 

 great peaks — Mowna Roa, (Mauna Loa,) fourteen thousand feet high, 

 Mowna Kea, and Mowna Hualalei, from which eruptions occasionally 

 take place more extensive in their effects than any others on record, 

 except, perhaps, those in Iceland. They, nevertheless, contain large 

 tracts of fine land, which, under the influence of a regular and genial 

 climate, are made to yield all the productions of the tropical, and many 

 of those of the temperate regions ; and they are probably destined to be 

 to the countries bordering upon the North Pacific what the West Indies 

 are to those on the North Atlantic. They remain in the possession of 

 their aboriginal occupants, who appear to evince considerable aptitude 

 to receive instruction, and have, with the aid of some missionaries from 

 the United States, established a regular government, in the form of a 

 hereditary monarchy, under constitutional restrictions. The native 

 population is, however, rapidly diminishing, while that of foreigners, 

 especially from the United States, is increasing. 



The principal ports in the islands are Honoruru, (Honolulu,) on the 

 south side of Woahoo, and Lahaina, on the west side of Mowee. The 

 town of Honoruru contains about ten thousand inhabitants ; it is much 

 frequented, especially by the whaling vessels of the United States ; and 

 property to a great amount in manufactured articles, provisions, oil, 

 &c, belonging to American citizens, is often deposited there. Owyhee 

 has no good harbor, and the only places in it where vessels find secure 

 anchorage are the Bays of Karakakooa, (Kealakeakua,) in which Captain 

 Cook was murdered in 1779, and Toyahyah, (Kawaihae,) on the west 

 side of the island. 



About two thousand miles south-east from the Sandwich Islands are 

 the Marquesas Islands, of which the five northernmost, the most impor- 

 tant in the group, discovered in April, 1791, by Captain Ingraham, of 

 the brig Hope, of Boston, and named the Washington Islands, were 

 occupied, in 1842, by the French. Six hundred miles south-west of 

 these lie the Society Islands, of which the largest, Otaheite, or Tahiti, 

 according to the new nomenclature, has been the subject of conten- 

 tion between France and Great Britain, in consequence of the at- 

 tempts of the former power to take possession of it. The Marquesas 

 are small, rocky, and unproductive, and cannot afford support to more 

 than a small number of civilized people ; so that the French will proba- 

 bly find it prudent to abandon them. Otaheite, on the contrary, contains 

 a large extent of the richest soil, and has every other requisite for a 

 valuable possession to a maritime and commercial nation. 



