On Areas of Subsidence in the Vacific. 345 



north-west, and east-south-east. It should be remarked, that 

 the Sandwich group does not contain merely the seven or eight 

 islands usually so-called ; eight or ten others stretch off the 

 line to the north ; some, small rocky islets, and others, coral, 

 and the whole belong evidently to one series. I will not say 

 that there is a connection between the trend of these groups 

 and the area of subsidence, yet it looks much like it. 



A further point may be worthy of consideration. The Sand- 

 wich group consists of basaltic islands of various ages. The 

 island at the north-west extremity, Tauai, is evidently more 

 ancient than the others, as its rocks, its gorges, and broken 

 mountains, indicate. By the same kind of evidence, it is placed 

 beyond doubt, that igneous eruptions on these islands con- 

 tinued to be more and more recent, as we go from the north- 

 west to the south-east : at the present time the great active vol- 

 cano is at the south-east extremity of Hawaii, the south-east 

 island. The fires have gradually become extinct from the 

 north-westward, and now only burn on the south-west point of 

 the group. At the Navigators, and I believe also at the So- 

 ciety group, the reverse was true ; the north-west island was 

 last extinct. Is there any connection between this and the 

 fact, that low islands are numerous north-north-west of the 

 Sandwich Islands, and south-south-east of the Society ? Does 

 it indicate any thing with regard to the character or the sub- 

 sidence in these regions \ 



The time of these changes we cannot definitely ascertain ; 

 neither when the subsidence ceased, for it appears to be no 

 longer in progress. The latter part of the tertiary and the 

 succeeding ages may have witnessed it. Although I am by no 

 means confident of any connection, yet for those who would 

 find a balance-motion in the changes, I would suggest that the 

 tertiary rocks of the Andes and North America indicate 

 great elevation since their deposition ; and possibly during this 

 great Pacific subsidence, America, the other scale of the ba- 

 lance, was in part undergoing as great or greater elevation. 



But why if the Western American coast was rising, do wo 

 find no corals on its tropical shores to indicate it \ The cold 

 extratropical currents of the ocean furnish us with a satisfac- 

 tory reply. — American Journal of Science and Arts, vol. xlv. 

 No. I. p. 131, July 1843. 



