, 
a 
_ ing you the angle of that slope.* Iam ashamed that it has not 
102 T. Coan on Kilauea. 
We may be entertained with another grand eruption; but 
when and where it will burst the adamantine walls which now & 
confine the molten seas, we know not. : 
I said that I had lately visited Kilanea. During the latter part, 
of June, I left Honolulu where our mission had held its an- 
nual meeting, in company with a party of ladies, gentlemen 
and children, bound to Hilo, via Kau and Kilauea. We reached 
the voleano on the third of July, and left in on the fourth. But 
I regret to say, that, in consequence of a sprained foot, 1 was un- 
able to descend into the crater. [could therefore only survey it 
from the upper banks, and receive the reports of a partys who 
went down to the fires 
At Kilanea I was met by my son, T. Munson, from Hilo, arith 
an instrument to measure the augle of incliuation of the stream 
of lava on the northern precipice of the crater. On the fourth of 
July he went down for the purpose ; but as all that portion of the 
crater was full of boiling cauldrons, and as the whole bank was 
enveloped in dense smoke and deadly ases, he was unable to 
approach it. Meanwhile I had proceeded on toward Hilo with 
the ladies and children, none of whom could be persnaded to go 
down into that fiery abyss on account of the fearful actualy of 
the ftision. 
I exceedingly regret this athe and the more so as I know 
not when I shall be able to visit the spot again. Should fu 
permitted however, to revisit ie scene, nothing but an im 
bility shall prevent me from sit pe to your request, and Bis 
ied 
been done before, and my apology is, as a eaied, want of opportu- 
nity, unless | had gone up on purpose. Meanwhile, you willl 
thiuk, rest assured that that angle is uot less than 40. ° “AsIh 
measured other slopes, I compared them in my mind to whatI 
recollect of that when with extreme difficulty I clambered up it 
in 1835. — I intend nil to give it to you correctly, if spared 
to visit Kilauea aga 
You ask if bees were any small cones thrown ny along the 
course of the eruption of 1852. There were a few 
n the writer's Exploring Expedition Report on Geolo 179, these se eam 
of ‘sold lava descending the g slopes of Kilauea a Les tioned. Mr. Coan 
writes in reply to a request ey oo measure the angle of srg , there 
being some doubt with respect ee Thee ill be bet- — 
tet understood after a reference to the sketch pif ng ise at ix, of this Jour 
nal, p. 352. The great do’ cman “eg to the lake, a, in the south- 
west extremity of the cratered: D. Dax. 
