580 w - T. BRIGHAM ON THE RECENT 



and notes, on the remarkable volcanic phenomena of the past five months. The action of 

 tellurial forces upon our little island shell has been marvellous. The subsidence along the 

 coast of Puna, from the east cape at Kapoho to Apua, on the western line, is four to seven 

 feet, varying in different localities. The great sand-beach at Kaimu has been forced back 

 into the young and beautiful coco-palm grove, and also into the groves of pandanus, so that 

 trees now stand eight feet deep in sand, and many stand in the water. The plain of Kala- 

 pana (see fig. 27 on page 373) has sunk about six feet, and water four to five feet deep now 

 covers some twenty acres of what was once dry land. The old stone church is buried 

 nearly to the eaves in sand, and the tide rises and falls within it." 



This plain of Kalapana was doubtless at some former time buried much deeper beneath 

 the sea. A coral reef of several yards thickness stretches half across the mouth of the 

 valley, and formed a barrier against further encroachments of the sea. It was three or four 

 feet above high-water mark, and formed a convenient site for the village. The church that 

 Mr. Coan mentions was on this coral mound towards the shore. As the wall of rock which 

 bounds the plain on the southerly side shows plainly that some former subsidence was 

 caused by a rupture of the crust forming the floor of the plain from this wall, it would have 

 been well to note any change at this point. Mr. Coan observed none, and the loose rocks 

 knocked down by the protracted earthquakes would perhaps obliterate any traces of so 

 slight a dislocation as a fall of six feet would cause. 



" At Kealakomo the saltrworks are destroyed, and the fountain on the shore sunk. Apua, 

 the last village in Puna, was swept clear [by the tidal wave of April 2d], and sunk. Its 

 pretty sand-beach and miniature bay, rendering it a resort for fishermen, are no more ; the 

 sea stands some six feet deep where the houses once stood. The same is true of Keauhou, 

 the first village in Ka-u, and an important pulu station ; coco-nut trees stand seven feet deep 

 in the water, and all the buildings were swept away by the tidal wave. Passing on to Pun- 

 aluu, this wave rose twenty feet, and swept all before it. The great sand barrier which 

 protected the beautiful pond and the cold, limpid spring, was first swept into the sea, and 

 then brought back and deposited in the pond, filling it up, and changing the shore-line. I 

 got the height of this wave by measurement on a palm-tree, and also upon the surrounding 

 ridge of scoriform lava, making the rise above common high-water about twenty feet. 



" From Punaluu onward to Honuapo, all houses were swept away except two standing on 

 high lava ridges. The road was strown with boulders and fragments of rocks, and in some 

 places it has sunk, so that it is with great difficulty, and not without a guide, that the trav- 

 eller threads his zigzag way along this coast for five miles. Not a house remains in the con- 

 siderable village of Honuapo ; the sea occupies the site of former dwellings. The wave here 

 corresponded to that at Punaluu, as shown by measurements on coco-nut trees. There were 

 points where the influx of the sea was greater than at other places, and this seems to have 

 been caused by the approach of the wave from the southwest, or at an angle of 45° to the 

 shore, and by striking headlands and projecting points causing the waters to heap up within 

 the points of tangency, while the current swept on at a lower mark where the coast pre- 

 sented no lateral obstructions. The foregoing remarks will apply to the whole coast from 

 Kapoho to Kalae, the southern cape. 



" In crossing over the great lava-fields from Puna to Ka-u, I passed about nine miles to 

 the south and leeward of Kilauea, the great volcano flanking us on the right. The country 

 through which we passed was terribly rent by the earthquake of April 2d, and in some 



