GEOLOGY AND TOPOGRAPHY OF HAWAII. 159 



altitude to accomplish the extraordinary feat. The river of molten stone con- 

 tinued to flow, advancing a great part of its length through its self-made conduit, 

 until some time during July. 



The Eartiiqu.vke of 1868. 



The date of 1868 is made memorable in the annals of Hawaiian history by 

 reason of the severe earthquakes which preceded and attended the eruption of 

 that year. The eruption which took place low down on the Kau slope — the 

 opposite side of Mauna Loa from which previous eruptions had issued — was an- 

 nounced, as usual, by activity in the summit crater. On March 27th smoke 

 was seen issuing from the top of the mountain. Within half an hour a column 

 of illuminated cloud had risen to the height of ten or fifteen miles, but the flow 

 did not occur at once. During the few days immediately following that portion 

 of the island was in an almost continual state of earth shock. On April 2nd a 

 terrific earthqiudce took place which shook down every stone wall and almost 

 every house in the Kau district. The greatest shock occurred in the vicinity of 

 Waiohinu, where the stone church and other buildings were completely demol- 

 ished. The earth continued to tremble until April 7th, when lava broke out in 

 Kahuku five thousand six hundred feet above the sea, through a great rent in the 

 mountain side that was ten miles from the ocean. The lava spouted sevei'al hun- 

 dred feet high and in two hours the torrent of fire reached the sea. Within the 

 five days that it continued to flow, as much lava was poured out as would have 

 issued from a rupture at a higher elevation in months. While no lives were lost 

 in the flow three men were imprisoned several days on a hill that was completely 

 surrounded by the lava flood, and several houses and a large number of cattle 

 were destroyed, while more than four thou.sand acres of good land were turned 

 into a worthless heap of stone. 



The earthquake detached a large mass of clayey soil on the mountain side 

 at Kapapala, causing a destructive land-slide or "nuid flow" to rush down the 

 valley for three miles in a stream, half a mile wide and thirty feet deep. Thirty 

 human beings and five hundred or more domestic animals were overwhelmed 

 by this earth avalanche. 



Immediately following the earthquake an immense tidal wave, estimated 

 to be forty or fifty feet in height, rolled in on the Kau coast and swept away 

 several villages, drowning eighty people and leaving the survivors destitute. 

 While these events were transpiring on the might}' mountain of Mauna Loa, 

 the lava in Kilauea escaped through a great fissure which opened low down to 

 the southwest of the crater. As the lava escaped it left in Kilauea a pit three 

 thousand feet long and five hundred feet deep. During the same year, while the 

 people were still in an anxious mood, on August 15th the sea about the islands 

 made a sudden rise and fall which although attributed by some to Mauna Loa at 

 the time, was later found to be caused by a terrible eartlKjuake in Peru and 

 Ecquador. 



The great flow of 1880, as usual was announced bv a beacon from ^lokua- 



