438 



DISTRIBUTION OF PLANTS. 



character, and there was little or no overflowing of the depressions in 

 rills of running water. 



Immediately after our arrival, arrangements were made for the 

 ascent of Mauna Roa ; and a large party having been formed, I set 

 out with others on the 14th of December : the route continuing all 

 the way upon the lava-covered portion of the island. We first pro- 

 ceeded Southward, towards the Great Ckater ; whose place is recog- 

 nized on a clear day by the ascending smoke-like vapor, like a heavy 

 overhanging cloud in the distance. At the end of "four miles," we 

 entered the forest ; which, in extending over the lava-streams, was 

 already diminished in width to only "two miles;" but after passing 

 the continuous belt, patches of woods were in sight at intervals on 

 either side of our route. We kept on, regularly though almost imper- 

 ceptibly ascending ; and with the coming on of night, the distant 

 crater in front illumined our path. The light diffused around by the 

 Great Crater is neither direct, nor in general reflected, coming from 

 the bottom of a pit a thousand feet deep ; yet is at times so great, that 

 " persons have read by it at Hilo, thirty miles distant." The night 

 was far advanced when I reached the half-way house, in company 

 with some of the foremost of our party. 



On the morning of the 15th, I proceeded in advance; ascending, 

 hardly perceptibly, over the same sort of open country as on the pre- 

 vious evening ; over a lava-surface rising in little prominences ; the in- 

 tervening soil-covered depressions clothed with herbage, and in some 

 instances containing a diminutive pool of water, and marshy ground 

 filled with the small Rhynchospora. Throughout this wide-extending 

 extremely gradual slope, say from the elevation of 2000 feet to that of 

 4000, low bushes of a Yaccinium and gen. Epacrid. were growing in 

 the soil-covered inequalities and in clefts, together with the Hamelinia 

 everywhere conspicuous ; and among other frequent plants, three spe- 

 cies of an Iris-leaved <jen. Reatioid ; the dwarf tree-fern, Blecltimm 

 Fontanesianum ; the Lythrum ; a Plantago, somewhat resembling P. 

 lanceolata ; a luidua, taking the place of our Northern Gentians ; a 

 Sccevola ; a Stecia?, at least agreeing in aspect; a normal Panicmn ; 

 a Hypnoid Lycopodium ; and a Poly podium resembling P. vulgare. 

 On the right, the patches of woods seemed to form an irregular but 

 continuous forest ; screening from view the basal portion both of 

 Mauna Kea and Mauna Roa. 



In the middle of the afternoon, I came upon a crevice, where the 



