202 On the Volcanic Character of the Island of Hawaii. 



this rough and pointed bed. Incessant almost as was its re- 

 currence, it often presented something new or more striking 

 than what had appeared before. On the 30th they travelled 

 over another tract of lava " about 200 rods wide, which had 

 been violently torn to pieces, and thrown up in the wildest 

 confusion. In some places it was heaped forty or fifty feet 

 high. The road across it was formed of large, smooth, round 

 stones, placed in a line two or three feet apart." On these 

 the missionaries passed over, by stepping from one to another, 

 but not without considerable fatigue. They were shown the 

 place where, in one of the wars of Tamehamaha, a party of 

 his enemies, about 80 men, being the warriors of two villages, 

 were, during their repose at night, destroyed by a volcanic 

 eruption. 



In their progress along the south-eastern side of the island, 

 they arrived at the village of Milone, celebrated on account of 

 a short pebbly beach called Shoroa. Of these stones they had 

 been accustomed to form, not only cutting instruments, but to 

 fabricate gods. It required considerable skill to select those 

 which would answer; and as they were supposed to be endowed 

 with sex, one of each kind was selected, when they were about 

 to be transformed into gods. They were wrapped up together 

 in a piece of cloth, and after a certain time a small stone was 

 found with them, which, when grown to the size of its parents, 

 was taken to the heiau and made afterwards to preside at the 

 games. 



Although the climate of Hawaii is hot, and the thermome- 

 ter on the evening of July 31st stood at 70°, the air from the 

 mountains soon became so keen that, although in a tropical 

 climate, they found a fire very comfortable. 



As they were travelling upon the high land, they perceived 

 a number of columns of smoke and vapour rising at a consi- 

 derable distance, and also one large steady column that seemed 

 little affected by the wind, and which, as they were told, arose 

 from the great crater of Kirauea. 



The next day three of the party visited the places whei'e 

 they had seen the columns of smoke rising the day before. 



They travelled five miles over a considerably fertile and 

 cultivated country, the soil of which was composed of the de- 

 composed surface of a bed of ancient lava, upon which shrubs 

 and trees had grown to a considerable height. As they ap- 

 proached the places from which the smoke issued, they passed 

 over a number of fissures or chasms, from two inches to six 

 feet in width. " The whole mass of rocks had evidently been 

 rent by some violent convulsion of the earth, at no very distant 

 period," and when they came in sight of the ascending columns 



of 



