216 EEPORT — 1887. 



I wish to lay stress on this, because engineers and others judging of 

 Japanese earthquakes by the amplitudes of motion which have been 

 published, which, so far as I am aware, have only been published by 

 observers in Japan, cannot furnish any ideas of relative intensity, and 

 from the amount of damage we sustain refer to the earthquakes of this 

 country as being ' mild in character,' ' mere tremors,' &c., while those 

 of Ischia and other places in Europe are severe. (See, for example, 

 Construction in Earthquake Countries, ' Proceedings of the Institute of 

 Civil Engineers,' vol. Ixxxiii. Pt. I.) In Japan we suffer but little 

 damage on account of the nature of our buildings, but now that many 

 ordinary European buildings are springing up the damage will probably 

 increase. Earthquakes like the one here referred to occur in Japan as 

 pointed out by Professor Sekiya about once a year, while near Tokio they 

 are experienced every few years. Still larger earthquakes have hitherto 

 recurred near to Tokio and Yokohama every thirty or fifty years. The 

 following are the dates of the more important of these disturbances: 

 A.D. 1293, Kamakura, a city near to the origin of the last earthquake, was 

 destroyed, and 30,000 lives were lost. Others occurred in 1419, 

 1433, 1435, 1495, 1510, 1589, 1633, 1647, 1649, 1650, 1683, 1703 

 (when there was shaking for 200 days, and 100,000 people killed), 1707, 

 1771, 1772, 1783, 1794, 1812, 1853, and 1855. 



Sounding Asama Yama. — Asama Tama is an active volcano about 

 seventy-five miles N.W. from Tokio. It was last in eruption in 1870, and 

 it is always violently steaming. I first ascended this mountain, which is 

 about 8,800 feet in height, in 1877. At that time the crater, which has 

 the appearance of a bottomless pit with perpendicular sides, was audibly 

 roaring and belching forth enormous volumes of sulphurous vapour. 

 The drifting of these vapours across the snow rendered it extremely 

 bitter. Some of this snow was liquefied and carried to Tokio for chemical 

 examination. The examination only yielded pure water, whatever it was 

 that had given the snow its peculiar taste having probably been evapo- 

 rated during liquefication. My next visit to Asama was in the spring of 

 1886. One of the chief objects of this expedition was to satisfy a 

 curiosity which had arisen with regard to the depth of the crater. Many 

 visitors to the summit reported that at favourable moments, when the 

 wind had blown the steam to one side, they had been able to see down- 

 wards to an enormous depth. One set of visitors, who had remarkable 

 opportunities for making observations, were convinced that if the crater 

 was not as deep as the mountain is high above the plain from which it 

 rises (5,800), it must at least be from 1,500 to 2,000 feet in depth. 

 Although I had provided myself with sufficient wire and rope to solve 

 this problem, owing to the inclemency of the weather and the quantity of 

 snow then lying on the mountain, the expedition proved a failure. One 

 of our number had to give up the attempt to reach the summit at about 

 6,000 feet above sea-level, while I a.nd my remaining companion only 

 reached it with great difficulty. Our stay was very short. The wind, 

 which was at times so strong that we were often compelled to lie down, 

 rendered it impossible to approach the crater, and after a few minutes' 

 rest we beat a retreat, worn out with fatigue, across the snow-fields, to- 

 wards our starting-point. 



Two months after this a visitor who ascended the mountain by moon- 

 light reported that the crater was only 200 feet in depth, and that at the 

 bottom there was a glowing surface. A second visitor. Colonel H. S. 



