1856.] SAWKINS SOUTH SEA ISLANDS. 383 



6. On the Movement of Land in the South Sea Islands. 

 By James Gay Sawkins, Esq., F.G.S. 



ToNGATABOO, One of the Friendly Islands, was visited a few months 

 previous to my sojourn there in 1854 by an earthquake, when the 

 north-east portion of it was tilted down to an inclination sufficient to 

 produce an encroachment of the sea for nearly two miles inland, 

 gradually diminishing to the south-eastern shore as far as Nuku- 

 alofa, where it now washes the roots of a tree that grew within a 

 garden adjoining a house that has been entirely destroyed. The 

 western coast has visibly risen some feet, and a spring of water has 

 sunk below the surface. 



The island is formed of coral ; there is no appearance of volcanic 

 intrusion through it ; but there have been disturbances that have 

 elevated some parts as high as 1 1 6 feet, with a good depth of vegetable 

 soil on them, which in the low land assumes the form of peat, emit- 

 ting under the rays of the sun strong humic acid. 



The overflow of the sea on the northern and eastern sides of the 

 island, and the elevation on the south and west, are interesting in 

 connection with the report of another island having appeared about 

 this time to the westward. This fact was asserted by many, and 

 among them by a whaling captain who had cruised often over the 

 same track, and who landed in an open boat with his crew on the 

 western coast, having stranded his vessel on the said island, which he 

 described as being only a^few inches above the ocean (at a distance 

 of thirty miles), and covered with black sand exactly like that on 

 the shores of other volcanic islands in this and the Haabai group ; he 

 said that "' tons of this sand were being levelled down by the wash of 

 every wave." I made particular inquiry of the natives of Tongataboo 

 if they had ever before seen any appearance of land in that direction, 

 to which they replied. No, — ^but that it was their belief that it rose 

 on the night of the earthquake (Christmas-eve, 1853), when the sea 

 came over the land at Hihifo (the North Point). 



Since this occurrence an eruption took place at Niuafoou, an 

 island to the north, which destroyed nearly one half of its inha- 

 bitants ; it occurred about midnight, and so sudden was the over- 

 flow of lava from several apertures in the vicinity of a village, that 

 the people who ran for the shore were overtaken by it and destroyed. 

 This eruption was not felt at Tongataboo. 



From these and other circumstances I am very doubtful if there 

 exists so great an amount of subsidence as of upheaval of land at 

 present in the Pacific ; also the fact of my never having been able 

 to find a well-rounded pebble or much-waterworn stone among the 

 alluvial deposits in the interior of any of these islands, convinces me 

 there has been no drift as in Europe, and forcibly leads me to the 

 opinion that a continent is forming and not disappearing, as some 

 have been led to suppose by a similar oscillation, perhaps, as I have 

 endeavoured to describe. 



When examining the Island of Tahiti, one of the Society Islands, 

 ascending some of its higher mountains I found several strata of 



