The land on which the buildings stand has an excellent and valuable spring of water, sufficient to irrigate it. There are one hundred acres in this lot, all enclosed by a good stone wall, and in part under cultivation. Another hundred acres adjoining, is also enclosed with a stone wall, and is devoted to pasturage. Another hundred acres of woodland lies about two miles distant. The buildings will suffice for the present.
An observer, familiar with the college edifices of the United States, may hardly be able to recognize a College in what he sees at Punahou. But what there is surpasses what were the visible beginnings of either Harvard, or Yale. Until the present time, moreover, there has been only a preparatory school. The first college class, and that a small one, commences the present year. A number of young men, once at Punahou, who would perhaps have been in the College had there been one, are at Williams, Yale, or some other of our American Colleges. Some have completed their preparations for life's business, and are preachers, missionaries, merchants, or connected with the government of the Islands.
The Endowment.
The cost of living at the Sandwich Islands has been materially increased by the settlement and mines of California. Just at present, it may not be easy to bring the expenses of a family at Punahou within the bounds recommended for the salaries of the officers of College. The arrangement for salaries should be based, however, on what we know to be the general course of things in the world. Fifteen hundred dollars, with the use of a house, is thought not to be too large a salary for the President of the Oahu College; and twelve hundred dollars, with the use of a house, for a Professor. The American Board will pay these two salaries for the years 1856 and 1857.
The Trustees propose to raise the sum of fifty thousand dollars. This is not too large a beginning. Of this sum the Hawaiian government engages to give ten thousand dollars, or one fifth part; on condition that the remaining forty thousand dollars be raised before July 6, 1858, and that the King have the right of nominating two of the twelve trustees of the College. The Prudential Committee have voted to subscribe five thousand dollars towards the endowment, on behalf of the American Board, payable in the year 1858.
It should be understood that, excepting the duty of approval or disapproval in respect to the election of members on the Board of Trustees, laid upon the American Board by the Charter for the space of twenty years, that Board has no connection whatever with the College, or control of its proceedings. The College is an independent institution, sustaining no other relation to the Board, than it does to every other benefactor.
The Colleges of New England had generally some benevolent patron provided for them by Divine Providence;—a Harvard, a Yale, a Dartmouth, a Brown, a Bowdoin, a Williams; and the Colleges very properly took and embalmed their names in memory of an enlightened and refined Christian community. These provided the general endowment. Many liberal men also funded particular professorships; or gave funds for the education of young men of talents and character, without the means of obtaining a liberal education. May the Lord raise up such benefactors for the Oahu College. That has grown, as the New England Colleges did, out of a great religious movement and the wonderful blessing of God on that movement. It has a religious object, and is controlled by a religious influence. The funds have every practicable guard from perversion. The permanent necessity for such an institution is apparent in the certainty of a permanent, rising, influential community on those admirably situated Islands. The independence of the Hawaiian Nation,—which, under present circumstances, is most favorable to its development,—is guaranteed by the United States, Great Britain and France; and the presumption of its falling under the dominion of a power foreign to us, is too small to deserve notice; and the influence of the College itself, as already described, will be one of the most effectual guards against such a result. There is not a finer climate in all the world. Were it true, that the native population is still wasting away, the effect of corrupt commerce in old heathen times, still greater would be the need of such an institution. A flourishing community of some kind at the Sandwich Islands, then certainly will be; and the religious influences now at the Islands will be as available for that community, as hereafter developed, with whatever elements, as it will be for the one now existing.
A number of gentlemen have kindly consented, at the request of the Prudential Committee of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, acting for the Trustees of the College, to take charge of the funds contributed in this country for the Oahu College, (where the donors do not direct them to be remitted directly to the Trustees at the Islands;) and they will invest such funds in the United States, and cause the interest to be remitted annually to the officer of the corporation legally authorized to receive it. The Trustees for the Fund, appointed in the first instance by the Prudential Committee, will fill the vacancies occurring in their own number; and they will be authorized to transfer the investment of the funds to the Sandwich Islands whenever they and the Trustees of the College concur in the opinion, that this can be safely and advantageously effected.
The following gentlemen compose the Trustees for the Funds to be invested in the United States; namely,—
Henry Hill, Esq., of Boston, Mass.
Pelatiah Perit, Esq., of New York city.
Gen. William Williams, of Norwich, Conn.
Hon. Thomas W. Williams, of New London, Conn.
Henry P. Haven, Esq., of New London, Conn.
James Hunnewell, Esq., of Charlestown, Mass.
William E. Dodge, Esq., of New York city.
Abner Kingman, Esq., of Boston, Mass.