DESCRIPTION OF DEEP-SEA FISHES FROM THE COAST 

 OF HAWAII, KILLED BY A LAVA FLOW FROM MAUNA 

 LOA. 



By David Starr Jordan, 



Of Stanford University, California. 



In November, 1919, I received from a former student, Mr. Carl 

 Schurz Carlsmith, a resident of Hilo, Hawaii, a small collection of 

 fishes killed on the southwest of the island of Hawaii by a lava flow 

 from an eruption of Mauna Loa. 



The circumstances under which these were taken are related by 

 Mr. Carlsmith as follows : 



At the end of September, 1919, a lava flow started in the district of Kau on the 

 island of Hawaii, and flowed to the sea through the land of Alika, which name was 

 given to the flow to distinguish it from others. The lava was of a very fluid variety, 

 and upon reaching the sea it built a tunnel for itself upon the floor of the ocean. The 

 offshore water at this point is very deep, and within a hundred feet or more of the 

 shore reaches a depth of at least 200 fathoms. On visiting the place in a native canoe 

 on the night of October 1, I found that the subterranean tunnel was bursting at vari- 

 ous points with heavy detonations and sending up thick clouds of steam. These 

 clouds of steam were noticed by me as far as 2 miles from the point where the flow 

 entered the ocean. A large number of fish, eels, and other sea life were killed by the 

 heat and explosions, and many curious forms were found floating on the water. Some 

 few days later, probably October 6, Tom Jteinhardt, a boatman, was on his way from 

 the flow to Hilo, and at a point, estimated by him to be 3 or 4 miles offshore, saw the 

 water in ebullition and found a large number of boiled fish. He is a Part-Hawaiian 

 and has spent his life on the water close to the shore. None of these fish were known 

 to him and the specimens which are submitted herewith were taken by him floating 

 on the top of the water and brought to the native fish inspector of Hilo. The latter 

 did not recognize any of the forms, and I was requested to find anything definite 

 referring to the names, habitat, and other points of interest. 



The specimens were all sun-dried when received by me, but their 

 characters are easily made out. They are of special interest as rep- 

 resenting an offshore fauna, beyond the reach of nets, but protected 

 from the dredge by the extreme roughness of the lava-strewn sea- 

 bottom. Seven species, five of them representing each a genus new to 

 science, are included in the collection, these having escaped the shore 

 explorations of Jordan and Evermann in 1901, and the deep-sea 

 work of the Bureau of Fisheries steamer Albatross, directed by Charles 

 H. Gilbert in 1902. 



Proceedings U. S. National Museum, Vol. 59-No. 2392. 



643 



