THE AMERICAN BOTANIST 



49 



"Wai-aleale stands haughty and cold, 

 Her lehua bloom, fog-soaked, droops pensive ; 

 The thorn-fringe set about swampy Ai-po is 

 A feather that flaunts in spite of the pinching frost. 

 Her herbage is pelted, stung by the rain ; 



Bruised all her petals, and moaning in cold 

 Mokihana's sun, his wat'ry beams." 



Commenting", he says, the * 'summit, a cold, fog-swept 

 wilderness of swamp and lake, beset with dwarfish growths 

 of lehua, is used as the symbol of a woman, impulsively kind, 

 yet in turn passionate and disdainful. The physical attributes 

 of the mountain are ascribed to her, its spells of frosty cold- 

 ness, its gloom and distance, its fickleness of weather, the 

 repellent hirsuteness of the stunted vegetation that fringes the 

 central swamp ..." The mele is indicative of the intimate 

 knowledge of these summit bogs possessed by the ancient 

 Hawaiians, and to this day the only reliable guides are the few 

 remaining old-time Hawaiians. 



Oahu has only one very small bog, located on the summit 

 of Ka-ala, in the Waianae Mountains, elevation 4030 feet, 

 This range is very old and has suffered great erosion and 

 degredation. Unlike Kauai, there are practically no uplands. 

 The summit ridges are exceedingly narrow, the comb of the 

 ridge averaging less than six or eight feet in width. From 

 the lowlands the summit of Ka-ala appears tabular, but this 

 is an optical illusion. The bog is only a few square rods in 

 area, and is abruptly bounded by extensive precipices. The 

 soil is a deep, spongy peat mold, interlaced with tree roots 

 and decaying branches. The trees are stunted, wind-swept, 

 and very old. The lapa-lapa tree (Cheirodendron platyphyllum 

 (Hook. & Arn) Seem.), is a distinctive species of this swamp. 

 All of the woody vegetation is covered with saturated clumps 

 of epiphytic mosses, liverworts, lichens, and ferns. The gen- 

 eral impression is that of senility. There are many indications 

 that this is the 'last stand" of what was at some former time 

 a much more extensive bog. The heavy precipitation that 



