CussEN. — Thermal Activity in Buapehu Crater. 377 



chimney of the Auckland Freezing Company's establishment. 

 The sea was visible beyond the east and west coasts, and all 

 the successive mountain ranges and river valleys in both direc- 

 tions could be traced out with our telescopes. The rugged 

 peaks of the Kaimanawa Mountains, extending for many miles 

 away to the eastward, looked rather insignificant beneath us, 

 although their height varies from 4,000 to 6,000 feet above the 

 sea. The crater of Ngauruhoe, nine miles to the north of us, 

 looked like the dilapidated chimney of some vast furnace down 

 into which we were looking. Taupo Lake, which I have seen 

 described as " a vast inland sea," as seen from some of these 

 mountains, looked quite small from our great height. The 

 distant peaks of Pirongia, Te Aroha, and other prominent 

 features of the Lower Waikato District looked but a short 

 distance away from us, considering they were over 120 miles 

 off ; and as all om* party hailed from that direction, each took 

 pleasure in recognizing the familiar landmarks which surrounded 

 his own home, and which he had not seen for many months 

 past. The comparatively low country lying between us and 

 the west coast, though intersected by deep valleys and mountain 

 ridges, seemed rather like a level plain, and, as one of our party 

 remarked, "the mountains only looked like potato ridges." 



The exact form and construction of the top of Euapehu 

 it would be impossible to describe, the whole mountain-top 

 being covered in a deep mantle of snow. The view presented 

 to the eye is as follows : three prominent peaks, one to the 

 extreme north being exactly a mile distant from where we stood, 

 and not quite so high as the peak we were on ; another half 

 a mile to the eastward of us, somewhat higher than ours. 

 Paretetaitonga itself, on which our station is, is a very sharp 

 pointed peak, formed of loose masses of probably trachytic 

 lava, broken into all shapes and sizes by the action of the frost. 

 It has an almost perpendicular inner face, so much so that the 

 snow seldom rests against it, and is soon thawed by the heat of 

 the sun on the rocks during the daytime. Between these three 

 principal peaks lies a snow-field of unknown depth. This snow 

 field is intersected by long crevasses running in all directions 

 through it ; they are from 10 to 30 feet in width, and run to 

 great depths ; some that we saw, I should think, were several 

 hundred feet deep. 



Deep down in a crateral hollow of basin-like shape, its steep 

 sides covered with perpetual snow and ice, is a pool of water of 

 a greyish-cream or drab colour. From the trig-station we over- 

 looked this lake, the peak on which we stood being the south- 

 west portion of the old crater-lips which surround the lake. 

 From its peculiar surroundings of snow and ice, it was difficult 

 to estimate with any degree of accuracy the diameter of the lake, 

 and time would not allow of a proper measurement. It appeared 



