FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   30   31   32   33   34   35   36   37   38  
39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   >>   >|  
utions of Honolulu are quickly seen, and deserve a visit. They show the care with which the Government has looked after the welfare of the people. The Queen's Hospital is an admirably kept house. At the Reform School you will see a number of boys trained and educated in right ways. The prison not only deserves a visit for itself, but from its roof you obtain, as I said before, one of the best views of Honolulu and the adjacent country and ocean. [Illustration: QUEEN'S HOSPITAL, HONOLULU.] Then there are native schools, elementary and academic, where you will see the young Hawaiian at his studies, and learn to appreciate the industry and thoroughness with which education is carried on all over these islands. You will see also curious evidence of the mixture of races here; for on the benches sit, and in the classes recite, Hawaiian, Chinese, Portuguese, half white and half Chinese children; and the little pig-tailed Celestial reads out of his primer quite as well as any. [Illustration: NATIVE SCHOOL-HOUSE IN HONOLULU.] In the girls' schools you will see an occasional pretty face, but fewer than I expected to see; and to my eyes the Hawaiian girl is rarely very attractive. Among the middle-aged women, however, you often meet with fine heads and large, expressive features. The women have not unfrequently a majesty of carriage and a tragic intensity of features and expression which are quite remarkable. Their loose dress gives grace as well as dignity to their movements, and whoever invented it for them deserves more credit than he has received. It is a little startling at first to see women walking about in what, to our perverted tastes, look like calico or black stuff night-gowns; but the dress grows on you as you become accustomed to it; it lends itself readily to bright ornamentation; it is eminently fit for the climate; and a stately Hawaiian dame, marching through the street in black _holaku_--as the dress is called--with a long necklace, or _le_, of bright scarlet or brilliant yellow flowers, bare and untrammeled feet, and flowing hair, surmounted often by a low-crowned felt hat, compares very favorably with a high-heeled, wasp-waisted, absurdly-bonneted, fashionable white lady. [Illustration: COCOA-NUT GROVE, AND RESIDENCE OF THE LATE KING KAMEHAMEHA V., AT WAIKIKI, OAHU.] As you travel through the country, you see not unfrequently one of the tall, majestic, large women, who were formerly, it is said by ol
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   30   31   32   33   34   35   36   37   38  
39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Hawaiian

 

Illustration

 

country

 

features

 

HONOLULU

 

schools

 
Honolulu
 

unfrequently

 

bright

 
Chinese

deserves

 

movements

 

invented

 

readily

 
ornamentation
 

dignity

 
tragic
 

accustomed

 

calico

 

intensity


walking
 

startling

 

eminently

 

received

 

tastes

 
perverted
 

expression

 

credit

 

remarkable

 

yellow


RESIDENCE

 

absurdly

 

waisted

 

bonneted

 

fashionable

 
KAMEHAMEHA
 

majestic

 
travel
 

WAIKIKI

 

heeled


necklace

 
scarlet
 

carriage

 

brilliant

 

called

 

holaku

 
stately
 

climate

 
marching
 
street