VOLCANOES. 713. 



Fig. 1109, p. 705); then, for seven miles, there were a few little patches of lava, and 

 some steaming fissures. Finally, 27 miles from Kilauea, 12 from the sea, and 1,250 

 feet above tide-level, an outflow began from fissures, and continued on to the sea at 

 Nanawale; and three tufa-cones (Fig. 1114) were thrown up over points in these fis- 

 sures on the sea-shore. It was a tapping of the mountain and letting out of the lavas ; 

 and contemporaneously they fell 400 feet within the crater, — to pp', Fig. 1111, which 

 plain then became the bottom of the lower pit 



The same quiet has generally attended the eruptions of the summit-crater of Mount 

 Loa. The courses of some eruptions are shown on the accompanying map. 



In January, 1843, an outflow began, through fissures 13,000 feet above the sea (No. 1, 

 Fig. 1115), and continued on northward and westward for twenty-five or thirty miles. 

 It broke out in silence, though one of the grandest eruptions on record, and finished its 

 work without an earthquake. 



In February, 1852, a bright light at the summit announced another eruption (No. 2, 

 Fig. 1115) : after three days, it was continued by means of a second outbreak, 4,000 feet 

 lower, or 10,000 above the sea, which also was a quiet one. At this second opening, as 

 described by T. Coan, there was a fountain of fiery lavas, 1,000 feet broad, playing to 

 a height at times of 700 feet, with indescribable grandeur and brilliancy. There were 

 rumbling and muttering from the plunging flood, and explosions, but no earthquakes. 

 Mr. Coan attributed the fountain to the hydrostatic pressure of the column of lava 

 above. 



In August, 1855, another great eruption began (No. 3, Fig. 1115), without noise or 

 shakings, at an elevation of 12,000 feet; and for a year and a half the flood continued: 

 the whole length of the stream was sixty miles. 



In January, 1859, there was still another eruption (No. 4, Fig. 1115). It made its 

 first appearance near the summit, in the same quiet manner as the preceding, Kilauea 

 remaining undisturbed. About 1,500 feet above the sea, on the northwest side of the 

 mountain, there was a larger opening, where the lavas were thrown up, "like the 

 waters of a geyser," to a great height. The stream here became wider, subdivided 

 into three or more lines, and continued on toward the base of Mount Hualalai; from 

 this point it bent northward, and then northwestward again, and finally entered the sea 

 on the western coast, after a course of over fifty miles. 



There were thus three great eruptions from the summit, with intervals of only three 

 years and a half, and four within sixteen years. 



On the 30th of December, 1865, there was again action at the summit, but no out- 

 break. Finally, in March and April, 1868, a fifth great eruption occurred, in which, 

 contrary to all known precedent, there were violent earthquakes; and, besides, Kilauea 

 took part, and probably furnished a portion of the lavas. On the 28th of March, steam 

 and light shot up from fissures on the southwest side of the summit (at m, Fig. 1115), 

 which were threats of an eruption. The light disappeared the same day, but earthquakes 

 followed which shook violently the southern half of the island, and opened many deep 

 rents. April 2nd, after a quaking that was "absolutely terrific," exceeding all that 

 had preceded it, great fissures opened, at Kahuku, in southwestern Hawaii (at n on the 

 map), from which floods of lava commenced flowing to the sea. As late as April 10th, 

 there were, near Kahuku, four fountains of lava playing to a height varving from 500 

 to 1,000 feet. Kilauea, although twenty-six miles from the place of outflow, and on 

 another side of Mount Loa, was simultaneously emptied; its bottom sinking 300" to 400 

 feet, as after the eruption of 1840. This emptying of the Kilauea crater was probably 

 due, not to its own eruption, but to the rendings of the mountain consequent on the 

 eruption of the central vent of Mount Loa; for only the lofty column of lava supplying 

 the latter could have produced the' fountains at Kahuku. After such events, it is not 

 incredible that Kilauea itself should have been begun in a rending of Mount Loa, accom- 

 panying some early eruption. 



In the eruptions of Kilauea, — one of the largest of volcanic craters, — there is evi- 

 dence only of the action of hydrostatic pressure and of vapors quietly evolved, as the 

 causes of the outbreak. The fountain had a head of lavas 3,000 to 4,000 feet high; 



