CENTRAL MOUND OF CONES, 69 



indications could be seen in projecting buttresses. 

 Here and there the rock appeared columnar, and 

 from some fallen fragments which lay upon the plain, 

 I judged to be a heavy subcrystalline porphyritic 

 lava or basalt. One half or more of the height of 

 the wall was an absolute precipice, with a few casua- 

 rinas growing on projecting ledges, but the lower 

 half was formed of a steep talus covered with long 

 grass and occasional skirts of wood. 



The conical mound which rises in the centre of 

 the Sandy sea, # and occupies almost half its width, 

 is composed of a number of conical or dome-shaped 

 masses of ashes and sand, apparently of very dif- 

 ferent ages, as some were covered with thick grass 

 and old trees, others with scanty woods of young 

 trees, while others were still bare. All these, except 

 the most recent, were furrowed by small gullies 

 radiating from the summit, and subdividing as they 

 descended, producing on a small scale an exact re- 

 presentation of the outer slopes of the large moun- 

 tains themselves. Craters, more or less worn down, 

 might be seen on the summit of these mounds, but 

 generally only their summits were at all distinct, 

 all their lower slopes uniting into the common mass. 

 The south side of this assemblage of hills seemed 

 the oldest, and the vent at present active is on the 



* This name of "laut pasir," "sea of sand," is, like many- 

 native names, a very fanciful and not a particularly appropriate 

 one ; its extent by no means resembles that of a sea, and being 

 on all sides bounded by a steep wall of rock, it looks even less 

 than it really is. 



