GEOLOGY AND TOPOGRAPHY OF II AAV. \ II. 139 



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

 tinued to How, advancing a great part of its h-iiulli throimh its self-made conduit, 

 )ititil some time diii-iiiL;' -TuIn'. 



The Earthqu.vke of 1868. 



The date of 1868 is made memoi'abie in tlie annals of Hawaiian iiistor\- l)y 

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

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

 opposite side of ^Inuna Loa from wliieh [)revious eruptions had issued — was an- 

 nounced, as usual, by activity in the sunnnit crater. On March 1^7th smoke 

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

 of illuminated cloud had risen to the height of ten or fifteen miles, hut 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 Api-il 2nd a 

 terrific earthquake 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 complete! \' 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 several 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 livi's wei'e 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 lai-ge nund)er of cattle 

 were destro^^ed, while more than four thousand 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 "mud flow" to rush down tlie 

 valley for three miles in a stream, half a mile wide and thirty feet deej). Thii-ty 

 human beings and five hundred or more domestic animnls were ovei'w helmed 

 by this earth avalanche. 



Immediately following the earthquake an inunense tidal wave, estimated 

 to be forty or fifty feet in height, rolled in on the Kau coast and swe|)t away 

 several villages, drowning eighty people and h-aviuL; the survivors destitute. 

 While these events were transpiring on the mighty uiountaiu of .Ma)ina Loa, 

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

 the southwest of the crater. As the lava escaix'd it left in Kilauea a pit thi'ee 

 thousand feet long and five hundred feel deej). Durinu th(» same \eai-, while the 

 people were still in an anxious mood, on .\ugust loth the sea about the islands 

 made a sudden rise and fall which although attributed by souu' to M.iuiia Koa at 

 the time, was later found to be caused by a tei-rible earHupiake in i*eru and 

 Ecquador. 



The great flow of 1880, as usual was announced by a beacon from ]\Iokua- 



