TRUE VOLCANOES. 393 



no opening that is to say, with basins of boiling lava of 

 from 30 to 200 feet in diameter only we must not forget 

 that the fiery gulfs on the slope of Stromboli throw out 

 ashes to a great height, and even pour out lava. Though 

 the great lava-lake of Kilauea (the lower and secondary 

 crater of the active volcano of Mouna Loa) sometimes 

 threatens to overflow its margin, yet it never actually runs 

 over so as to produce true streams of lava. These occur by 

 currents from below, through subterranean channels, and 

 the formation of new eruptive-openings at a distance of 

 from 16 to 20 geographical miles, consequently at points 

 very much lower than the basin. After these eruptions, 

 occasioned by the pressure of the immense mass of lava 

 in the basin of Kilauea, the fluid surface sinks in the 

 basin. 89 



Of the two other high mountains of Hawaii, Mouna Lea 

 and Mouna Hualalai, the former is, according to Captain 

 Wilkes, 190 feet higher than Mouna Loa. It is a conical 

 mountain on whose summit there no longer exists any 

 terminal-crater, but only long extinct mounds of scoriae. 

 Mouna Hualalai* is fully 10,000 feet high, and is still burn- 

 ing. In the year 1801 an eruption took place, during which 

 the lava reached the sea on the western side. It is to 

 the three colossal mountains of Loa, Kea and Hualalai, 

 which rose from the bottom of the sea, that the island of 

 Hawaii owes its origin. In the accounts given of the nume- 

 rous ascents of Mouna Loa, among which that of the expedi- 



89 This remarkable sinking of the surface of the lava is confirmed 

 by the relations of numerous voyagere, from Ellis, Stewart, and Doug- 

 las to the meritorious Count Strzelecki, Wilkes's expedition and the 

 remarkably observant Missionary Coan. During the great eruption of 

 June, 1840, the connection of the rise of the lava in the Kilauea with 

 the sudden inflammation of the crater of Arare, situated so far below 

 it, was most decidedly shown. The disappearance of the lava poured 

 forth from Arare, its renewed subterranean course, and final re-ap- 

 pearance in greater quantity, do not quite admit of an absolute con- 

 clusion as to identity because numerous lava-yielding longitudinal 

 fissures opened simultaneously below the line of the floor of the 

 Kilauea basin. It is likewise very worthy of observation, as bearing 

 on the internal constitution of this singular volcano of Hawahi, that 

 in June, 1832, both craters, that of the summit and that of Kilauea, 

 poured out and occasioned streams of lava, so that they were simul- 

 taneously active. (Compare Dana, pp. 184, 188, 193, and 196). 



