letter xxiv.] INTERIOR OF THE CRATER. 



225 



covered to a height of over 2000 feet by a luxuriant growth of 

 timber. On the leeward side, several black and very fresh- 

 looking streams of lava run into the sea, and the whole coast 

 for some height above the shore shows most vigorous volcanic 

 action. Elsewhere the rock is red and broken, and lateral 

 cones abound near the base. 



The ascent from Makawao, though it is over rather a desolate 

 tract of land, has in its lower stages such a dismal growth of 

 pining koa and spurious sandal-wood, and in its upper ones so 

 much ohelo scrub, with grass and common aspleniums quite up 

 to the top, that as one sits lazily on one's sure-footed horse, the 

 fact that one is ascending a huge volcano is not forced upon 

 one by any overmastering sterility and nakedness. Somehow, 

 one expects to pass through some ulterior stage of blackness up 

 to the summit, It is no such thing.; and the great surprise of 

 Haleakala to me was, that when according to calculation there 

 should have been a summit, an abyss of vast dimensions opened 

 beloAv. The mountain top has been in fact blown off, and one 

 is totally powerless to imagine what the forces must have been 

 which rent it asunder. 



The crater was clear of fog and clouds, and lighted in every 

 part by the risen sun. The whole, with its contents, can be 

 seen at a single glance, though its girdling precipices are nine- 

 teen miles in extent. Its huge, irregular floor is 2000 feet 

 below; New York might be hidden away within it, with abun- 

 dant room to spare ; and more than one of the numerous sub- 

 sidiary cones which uplift themselves solitary or in clusters 

 through the area, attain the height of Arthur's Seat at Edinburgh. 

 On the north and east are the Koolau and Kaupo Gaps, as 

 deep as the crater, through which oceans of lava found their 

 way to the sea. It looks as if the volcanic forces, content with 

 rending the mountain top in twain, had then passed into an 

 endless repose. 



The crater appears to be composed of a. hard grey clink- 

 stone, much fissured ; but lower down the mountain, the rock 

 is softer, and has a bluish tinge. The internal cones are of 

 very regular shape, and most of them look as if their fires had 

 only just gone out, with their sides fiercely red, and their 

 central cavities lined with layers of black ash. They are all 

 composed of cinders of light specific gravity, and much of the 

 ash is tinged with the hydrated oxide of iron. Very few of 

 the usual volcanic products are present* Small quantities of 

 * According to Mr. Brigham, the products of the Hawaiian volcanoes 



