J. D Dana — History of the Changes in Kilauea. 351 



5. Further testimony as to the eruption of 1879. — The follow- 

 ing testimony confirms the brief statement, on page 94, with 

 regard to the fact of this eruption. It is from the hotel book 

 of the Volcano House. 



1878. July 20. " Halema'uma'u in a most active state." M. 

 P. Robinson.— Sept. 20. " Yery active." J. Mott Smith. — Nov. 

 24. " Very active ; lava within a foot of top of bank." 



1879. Jan. 8. " South Lake with lava 50 feet below the 

 rim and boiling like water." Wm. Gardner. — March 19. "Large 

 and bright lake." — April 15. " Light wonderful." 



1879. April 21. " Bottom dropped out of crater." Wm. 



H. Lentz, of Honolulu. — Ap. 23. " Found the thing 



extinct." G. Grceper. — Ap. 28. "Almost extinct; some vapors." 

 Eev. A. 0. Forbes, of Honolulu.— Ap. 29. "No fire at all." 

 "Lake quite empty." J. Day. 



1879. June 24. " Throwing up jets-- of lava ; both lakes 

 active; looks like a fountain of fire from the verandah of the 

 Volcano House." Wm. H. Lentz. — July 2. " All traces of 

 two lakes of July, 1878, obliterated, and instead an enormous 

 single lake, which was quite active ;" " lava thrown up 50 feet." 

 Wm. Tregloan, of Honolulu. 



The eruption was a discharge of the lavas of the Great Lake, 

 as in that of March, 1886 ; and the lavas began to return in two 

 months or sooner. Miss C. F. Gordon Cummings,* who was at 

 the crater in the autumn of 1879, learned from others that the 

 discharge took place on April 21st. 



6. Premonitions and effects of the eruption of March, 1886, in 

 the vicinity of the Volcano House. — The situation of the Volcano 

 House is shown on plate II. It is within the great area of 

 subsidence, northeast of Kilauea, where are many fault-plane 

 precipices and numerous open fissures, many of the latter dis- 

 charging freely hot air and steam, fumarole-like, and some of 

 the deeper sending up also sulphurous acid gas. The large de- 

 pressed area adjoining the house on the west is a true Solfa- 

 tara, and the well-known extensive sulphur bank within it, — 

 the only real sulphur bank about Kilauea at the present time — 

 is hardly four hundred yards distant. A bathing house for 

 vapor baths is near by, which is supplied with hot vapors from 

 one of the fissures. The proprietor of the house, Mr. J. H. 

 Maby, informed me that on the afternoon of the 6th of March, 

 (Saturday) wishing to take a bath, he found at repeated visits 

 the vapors at the bath-house too hot for it, and finally gave it 

 up. At 9 h 30' of that evening a slight earthquake was felt, 

 and at 9 h 45', three others, which made " thud-like sounds," or 



* Fire Fountains of the Kingdom of Hawaii, 2 vols., 8vo, London, 1883. 



