UPOLU. 313 
though interrupted near the village of Falifa by a spur from the back 
range. This plain is a peculiar feature of this portion of the island. 
The greater part of it is backed by a long and lofty precipice. It 
appears like a section of a sloping mountain, and above there is still 
a narrow portion of the original slope of the range. 
The preceding remarks apply only to the northern side of the island ; 
the southern side between the same limits, partake, in part, of similar 
features; but the slopes, | am informed, are more gradual and less 
rugged. 
Going in either direction, east or west, from this central district 
of old and broken hills and deeply indented shores, the declivities 
rapidly become more even, and the shores more gently undulating. 
Instead of long points formed by the projection of spurs from the 
mountains and terminating in ragged cliffs, the sea is bordered by 
low plains, which almost imperceptibly rise into the gently sloping 
declivities of the mountain. 
In the western half of the island, the smoothness of the declivities 
and gentleness of the slopes is most remarkable from Sangana west- 
ward. Back of Apia, a few miles east of that place, there are many 
deep gorges, which, as seen from sea, appear only as ravines gullied 
out of the sloping surface, yet prove on examination, to be several 
hundred feet in depth, and enclosed by steep and nearly vertical walls. 
They become more numerous toward the central district. Near Apia 
there is a somewhat isolated elevation called Vaiea. 
The west end of the island, like the vicinity of Sangana, is a low 
gently sloping plain, three miles wide, and rising inland to the vol- 
canic cone of Tafua, standing back of Fasetoodtai. 
East of Taivea, toward the east extremity of the island, the same 
gradually rising surface and the same features characterize the 
country as at the west extremity. ‘The ravines are few and small. 
The declivities slope into a plain along the shores, except on the 
side of the island fronting the southeast, where the smooth-featured 
mountain terminates abruptly in a bluff wall, three to six hundred 
feet high. 
The Eastern and Western districts, as we shall call them, are both 
regions of comparatively recent volcanic action. Hach contains 
several craters of perfect unbroken outline, and in each, the smooth 
slopes, rarely exceeding five or six degrees in inclination, are owing to 
the broad streams of lava that have poured over from the different 
volcanic vents. The summit of the ridge in these districts is a little 
79 
