JVotice of Hawaii, (Owhyee,) and its Volcanic Regions, SfC. 235 



The rude hut, or rather screen against the wind — consisting of 

 poles propped in a slanting position, and covered on one side only 

 with a few leaves of the sugar cane, and bushes slightly placed upon 

 them — we thought for a time very comfortable, and wisely located as 

 to temperature ; being on a spot of ground of such grateful heat, 

 compared with the rawness of the mountain air, as to lead us to con- 

 gratulate ourselves in the advantage it afforded, as we sat on our va- 

 rious packages in front, and partook of our evening repast, within a 

 foot of a crevice, from which steam issued of such power as to cook 

 our potatoes in a short time, without the aid of fire. But when we 

 came to take possession of the mats, strewn inside of it for beds, we 

 found ourselves in quarters considerably hotter than those, in which, 

 Colman the poet puts his lodger over the bake shop. You will 

 scarce believe, that we all slept on a temperature of 120^ Fahrenheit 

 —but such is the fact : and it was well the air above was as low as 

 56° or 60^, so that by frequent turnings, we could let one side cool, 

 while the other was heating, or we should have been well-nigh par- 

 boiled by morning. There was no alternative however — it was the 

 only shelter — and as there were dashes of rain through the night, it 

 would have been almost death to have slept, in the open air, on any 

 cooler bed. We, therefore, made the best of the necessity ; and 

 after many a turn of restlessness, and some impatience, and forebo- 

 dings, we obtained a tolerable night's rest ; and were quite reconciled 

 to our dormitory, when, on rising, we found that the continued vapor 

 bath had dissipated, almost entirely, the stiffness of limbs which most 

 of us had suffered, from the length and rapidity of our walk. 



I rose at midnight, and went to the crater. The steam from above 

 was still driving, in thick volumes, over the cliffs ; and with the smoke 

 from below, rendered every thing obscure ; but various seats of fire, 

 in tremendoLis action, sent up flashes of light through the dimness, to 

 the highest clouds, and, at times, converted the whole body of smoke 

 into one lurid mass. Some of the spots, apparently most liquid and 

 most agitated, were situated immediately below the place where I 

 stood ; and, now and then, the fiery streams in them, circling widely 

 and swiftly in different directions, glared on the eye, in all the regu- 

 larity and brilliancy of the lamps of an orchestra. But as these ex- 

 hibitions were but fitful and obscure, compared with what I had on 

 a former occasion beheld, and the wind bleak and piercing, I was glad 

 to make a hasty and shivering return, to the warmth of my couch. 



