44 
PRESTON. 
They were kindly received by the natives, intermarried with 
them, and became the progenitors of well-known families of 
chiefs. Counting back through well-established genealogy 
and allowing thirty years to a generation, the wreck must 
have taken place between 1525 and 1530. 
Three Spanish vessels left Mexico on October 31, 1527, 
bound for the Molucca islands, in the East Indies. Two of 
them were lost. No other white people were navigating the 
Pacific at that period, and it seems reasonably certain that 
the wrecked vessel was one of the three sent out by Cortez. 
Their westward course lay to the southward, and the violent 
kona storms of the Pacific would carry them toward Hawaii. 
On the return trip they went north to latitude 30°, to take 
the westerly winds, and thus passed far above the islands. 
This explains why Hawaii, although known to the Spaniards, 
was seldom visited by them. Old charts in the archives at 
Madrid show conclusively that the Hawaiian islands were 
known during the sixteenth century. This bit of history and 
tradition may possibly explain similar terms in Spanish and 
Kanaka, of which there are many. On the island of Hawaii 
may be found at the present day an apparently full-blooded 
Kanaka child, with pure South Sea features, yet possessing 
a white skin and a complexion similar to that sometimes seen 
in the Spanish-Moorish mixture. Will any one say that this 
may not be a recurrence and manifestation of certain influ¬ 
ences in times past ? Examples are not wanting in our own 
race where effects appear after having lain dormant for 
generations. 
II.— Phonology. 
Vowels and Consonants.—hQt us now examine the language 
from the standpoint of sound. The Kanaka ear is as deli¬ 
cate in detecting vowels as it is dull in the distinction of 
consonants. When Isaac Pitman invented phonography he 
used the straight line and parts of a circle to represent the 
English consonants.. They were classified into labials, dentals, 
gutturals, liquids, etc., and the same signs, made heavy or 
