CAPTAIN COCK HONOURED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 20028, 18 August 1928, Page 11

CAPTAIN COCK HONOURED.

DISCOVERY OF HAWAII.

CEREMONIES AT HONOLULU.

TRIBUTE TO GREAT SAILOR. Australian and N.Z. Press Association. HONOLULU. Aug. 16. At the celebrations of Captain Cook's discovery of tho Sandwich Islands 150 years ago, 300 Japanese children, waving tho American, British, Australian and New Zealand flags, formed a gay group in the ceremonies as tho British marines with a pipe band and American sailors landed at Waimea, Kauai, to commemorate Captain Cook's fast landing in the islands. The ancient Hawaiian chant in honour of Cook contrasted with the drone of the aeroplanes, as they dropped flowers. Mr. Victor Houston, the Hawaiian member of the United States Congress, in a speech, said Captain Cook was "one of those men of whom Britain has been so prolific, who carried her flag through the world's waste places, in the advancement of scienco and human welfare."

The captains of the three British cruisers placed on the Cook monument a large wreath with ribbons from Britain, Australia and New Zealand.

The 150 th anniversary of the discovery of the Sandwich Islands by Captain Cook is being celebrated in Honolulu in pursuance of a joint resolution of both Houses of Congress, which voted a sum of money for the purpose. Navigators of several countries had traversed portions of the Pacific Ocean beforo the time of Cook. Spanish, English and Dutch had sailed its waters, but the commerce of America, north of Mexico, with Hawaii, the Orient, and thence to the Atlantic Slates and England, began a few years after the death of Cook, and led in time to the American occupation of Hawaii, which to-day is an integral part of the United States. In connection with the celebration a suitable series of postage stamps and a special 50-cent coin have been issued. A commission of five members was set up to carry out the celebration, including Colonel Curtis P. laukea, one of tlie few Hawaiian survivors of the former monarchy regimes. He becamo an official under King Kalakaua, and at various times was vice-chamberlain, adjutantgeneral of the Hawaiian Army; minister plenipotentiary and envoy extraordinary in the early 1880's, to various courts of Europe and Asia. He was also close to Queen Liliuokalani, particularly after her dethronement in 1893, and is now a trustee of the Liliuokalani estate. He was aide to Hon. S. M. Damon, of Hawaii, at the Jubilee of Queen Victoria in 1897, as he was a military aide, and chamberlain of the household when Queen Liliuokalani attended the jubilee ceremonies in London vi 1887. The earlier functions this week were a preface to the unveiling of a monument to Captain Cook, at Waimea, Kauai, on Thursday, where thero was given a pageant portraying the landing there of Captain Cook and his reception by the natives, followed by native dances and feasts. To-day a tablet was to be dedicated at the spot where Cook was killed, and also another neSr the where, on January 29, 1779, William Whatman was buried at the request of King George in. Captain Cook himself read the burial service, this being the first recorded Christian service on land on the Hawaiian Islands.