HAWAII, 



491 



flowed from tlie north-east side, and after covering a space of 300 square miles 

 reached the plain of Hilo close to the coast. Three years later another crater was 

 opened six miles north of the central one, discharging a double stream which 

 flowing west half filled up Kiholo Bay, 



On the east flank of Mauna-Loa has been opened the vast lateral crater of 

 Kilauea, at a height of about 4,000 feet above the sea. Kilauea, abode of the 

 formidable goddess Pelé, is an almost circular chasm about nine miles round, and 

 varying in depth with the movement of the boiling lavas at the bottom. During 

 the present century there has been no direct overflow from Kilauea or from the 

 other furnaces forming its eastern prolongation ; but the underground heat has 

 melted the rocks at a lower depth, and through these the fiery streams have found 

 their way to the surface. In 1868 one of these, after flowing some sixty miles to 



Fig. 221. — Ckateks of Mauna Loa and Kilauea. 



^ Q fe » f,..'>u:,,i,Zmft,iimi\ifiM,tbmiMUAm.iiAi]t,r ..^j 



»»fe *yv»-'°' 





■^t^^AtuA-t^A^V?, . J.«? 



155"40 



West o'^ breenwich 



I55"20 



6 Miles. 



the south-west, poured in a flaming cataract over the cliffs into the sea, where it 

 formed a pyramid of lavas which, by later accessions, has been gradually attached 

 to the mainland under the name of Kalae Point, Dana estimates at over fifteen 

 billions of cubic feet the quantity of molten rock discharged on one of these 

 occasions. 



North-west of Mauna-Loa, which covers a space of nearly 2,000 square miles, 

 the much less elevated Mauna -Hualalai (7,822 feet) is also occasionally active, 

 but all the other cones in Hawaii Island are extinct. One of these is streaked or 

 even covered with snow during a great part of the year, as indicated by its native 

 name, Mouna-Kea, the " White Mountain," It even overtops Mauna-Loa, its 

 highest peak rising, according to the ofiicial surveys, to an altitude of no less 

 than 13,850 feet, 



Hawaii is continued north-westwards by four mountainous islands and a few 



