ON ITS EXTERIOR. VOLCANOES. 381 



chain of mountains which seems to give the form to the 

 entire island. On the volcanic cross fissure, and as it 

 may seem at the point of intersection, we have the 

 high cone of Tongariro* (6198 feet), whose crater on 

 the cone of ashes has been reached by Bidwell; and, 

 rather more to the south, Kuapahu (9005 feet). The 

 north-east extremity of the zone is formed by a con- 

 stantly smoking solfatara, the island-volcano of Puhia-i- 

 wakati* ( 519 ) (White island, in the Bay of Plenty, lat. 

 38i. S.). Keturning to the south-west, we have first, 

 on the coast itself, the extinct volcano of Putawaki 

 (Mount Edgecombe), 9630 feet high; a snow-clad moun- 

 tain, and probably the loftiest in New Zealand; and 

 inland, between Mount Edgecombe and the still burning 

 Tongariro*, which has poured forth some streams of 

 lava, we find a long chain of lakes of which some are of 

 boiling water. The lake of Taupo, which is surrounded 

 by fine shining leucite and sanidine sand, and by hills 

 of pumice, is nearly twenty-four miles in length ; it is 

 in the middle of the northern island of New Zealand, 

 and is 1337 feet above the level of the sea, according to 

 Dieffenbach. The space around, for two English square 

 miles, is covered with solfataras, caves emitting vapours, 

 and thermal springs ; which last, like the geysirs in Ice- 

 land, form a variety of deposits of silicates. ( 52 ) To 

 the west of Tongariro*, the principal seat of volcanic 

 activity, whose crater still emits vapours and pumice 

 ashes, and which is only sixteen geographical miles 

 distant from the western sea, rises the volcano of Tara- 

 naki (Mount Egmont), 8838 feet high and which was 

 first ascended and measured by Dr. Ernst Dieffenbach 

 in November 1840. The summit of the cone, of which 



