72 Scientific Intelligence. 
volcanic dust and sand were dropped upon our houses and in our 
streets, over our walks and our -_ having been borne upon 
the winds for this great distan 
Ma Our mail leaves to-day, and I deeply regret that we 
have Bot seen the great fire since the night of the first and second 
inst. A dense cloud has rested upon the mountain by night and 
We hav tesa that no light shines through it. 
however, learned by people coming from Puna, and 
dicen via Kilauea, that the roaring furnace is still in fierce 
com and that its locality i is probably in the terminal crater, 
eruption upon the mountain, and that lava streams are flowing, 
but these reports are not fully reliable. 
Optical delusion and excited imagination often see unreal 
visions. During the terrific eruption and the rending earthquakes 
of 1868, men and women of entire veracity saw, as they thought, 
sea, within three miles of them, and all en in sa day, with 
nothing to obstruct their view, and yet, on going to the place 
where this lava flowed, as they asserted i in all honesty, there was 
no a or smell of fire. 
Since my former letter, dated June 20, 1879, Ailawea has re- » 
mitied.. great activity. Ra arely in its recorded history have the 
res. 
atera eke of liquid rock are bursting through the scoria- 
ceous sides alemaumau—the lake and cone in the southwest | 
part of the sashes: cal flowing down the declivities into the cen- 
tral depression, adding stratum to stratum, while t e great lake 
boils, and dashes its waves against its walls, and sends its burn- 
ing spray high into the air. The debris around the high walls of 
ciat is mee the Shetland Isles.—A paper on this subject, 
well illustrated by a geological eee showing the direction of the 
lacial striz, b B.N. Pracu and J. Horne, is ami in the 
Guarterly J TnL. of the Geological Society for 
8. Relief Geolog a cal Map of New oth oe ea relief geo- 
chedler, a map engraver of New York Cit shecbt 
9. Brief Notices of some guaaihes denwribed Min —Fredri- 
ite :—A mineral related to ter pe os but deuniaant by its 
containing lead and tin. It occurs only massive; the color is 
iron-black; hardness =3°5 ; specific rece =4°65. An analysis 
yielded : 
