﻿DE. TEMPEST ANDEESON ON THE [NOV. I9IO, 



Present State of the Cone and Lava-Fields. 



From the sea at night the view of the volcano is extremely 

 striking. 1 The glare from the incandescent lava in the crater 

 reflected on the clouds is visible for a distance of 50 miles or more, 

 while on nearer approach the spectacle of a number of streams 

 of red-hot lava descending into the sea and raising columns of 

 illuminated vapour is very remarkable and at present probably 

 unique. By day the view, though quite different, is equally 

 interesting. The crater rising to a height of 2000 feet with a 

 backing of hills, or rather mountains of double that height, and 

 with several old cones of different ages dotted around, is sur- 

 mounted by a magnificent canopy of white steam of the well-known 

 pine-tree shape, often breaking out into the equally well-known 

 cauliflower lobes. This frequently rises to a height of 8000 or 10,000 

 feet (PI. XLY, fig. 1). Surrounding the crater for a distance of a 

 mile or two in the shortest direction, and stretching down to the 

 coast in the sinuous line indicated on Mr. Williams's map, are the 

 great black lava-fields, which comprise an area of probably at least 

 20 square miles. At intervals along these lava-fields, and taking an 

 equally if not more sinuous line, are several conspicuous clouds of 

 vapour escaping from as many fumaroles, some of large size, which 

 mark the line of a great lava-tunnel to the sea-shore, and there are 

 some smaller ones in the other direction more to the west, which 

 show the position of a smaller underground stream towards Safune. 

 In the foreground again is the new coast-line formed of the wide- 

 spread fresh lava-currents, with usually several magnificent columns 

 of vapour rising some hundreds, or even thousands, of feet into the 

 air from the places where the, lava is for the moment falling into 

 the sea. With a very good glass the observer may perhaps distin- 

 guish the towers or other parts of two churches, which are nearly 

 all that mark the position of the destroyed villages of Saleaula and 

 Sataputu ; while a still more careful scrutiny will enable him to 

 make out a few dead tree-trunks still erect among the lava and 

 many more lying prostrate on its surface. Looking still farther 

 afield are large areas where whitened tree-trunks are all that remain 

 of the once dense tropical jungle, though in some places vegetation 

 is beginning to return. Such is the view, some details of which 

 call for a fuller notice. 



The cone does not rise high above the surrounding lava-field. 

 At the east side there is one point where the slope of the latter 

 continues uninterrupted to within about 50 feet vertical of the 

 lowest point of the lip of the crater, and even then the slope up to 

 it is still very gradual, and probably does not exceed 15°. At 

 other points the edge of the crater is somewhat more elevated, 2 

 and may reach an altitude 150 feet higher than the point referred 

 to ; and, as the lava-fields are in places lower, it is probable that 



1 At night I saw it once from the deck of a steamer of the Union Company 

 of New Zealand, once from a German man of war, twice from a schooner, and 

 also in the daytime from a boat. 



2 My aneroid reading made the height almost exactly 2000 feet. 



