614 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



"What makes these accounts more interesting and valuable 

 is the fact that both Mr. Biclwill and Mr. Dyson were per- 

 sonally known to my respected and valued friend the Eev. 

 William Colenso, F.E.S. — who, I am pleased to say, is present 

 with us to-night — at whose house, curiously, each traveller 

 stayed on his return from the mountain. To me the circum- 

 stance is doubly interesting, because, when relating my own 

 experiences to Mr. Colenso, I had no notion whatever that 

 he had heard almost a similar story nearly fifty years before — 

 indeed, years before I was born—and this from the very men 

 who succeeded in what at that time was a dangerous and, 

 indeed, perilous undertaking. 



It will have been noticed that there are wide differences 

 of opinion between the accounts given by Messrs. Biclwill, 

 Dyson, and myself as to the diameter, depth, activity, &c. 



At the time of Bidwill's visit the mountain appears to have 

 been in the condition of a geyser, or ^^wm., as the Maoris term 

 an intermittent spring ; nor does it appear that lava has been 

 ejected from the mountains in any eruption since 1839, although 

 flames are said to have been seen above the dense clouds of 

 smoke which have always been present during times of in- 

 creased activity. 



That the crater was formerly much deeper than it now is 

 appears certain ; and it would seem that at the times of Messrs. 

 Bidwill's and Dyson's visits the crater was not divided as it 

 now is, but consisted of a single yawning abyss in a state of 

 activity, resembling what was seen at Rotomahana shortly 

 after the eruption of Tarawera in 1886. I can only account 

 for the wide differences of opinion as to the diameter of the 

 crater by supposing that the eastern walls were much higher 

 and the rim much more unequal than at present. Hoch- 

 stetter's drawing of the summit of Ngauruhoe, as seen by him 

 in April, 1859, shows the western lip as being exceedingly low 

 as compared with the eastern ; and this, if it existed at the 

 time of Dyson's visit, may have misled him as to the width of 

 the crater during what was evidently a hurried and anxious 

 visit. It is much to be regretted that no rough drav/ing was 

 made of the crater by either Bidwill or Dyson ; but it is evi- 

 dent that important changes have taken place within the past 

 half-century. On the south and west, which are really the 

 steepest and longest slopes of the cone, the mountain is 

 deeply furrowed, and the peculiar arrangement of the lava 

 bands with loose ashes and scoria interbedded is causing the 

 mountain to wear away at a rapid rate wherever the lava- 

 stream has broken away so as to expose the loose ashes im- 

 mediately underneath. It is owing to this that the eastern 

 slope, which at one time was covered with a reddish scoria- 

 ceous band of lava about 4ft. in thickness, is now rapidly 



