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our way back along the same difficult passage by which we had come. 
Above the regularly stratified tuff-cone arises with steeper inclination 
the scorise-cone. It is closed up at its top, but displays at its west- 
ern declivity a flat indentation denoting the crater, from which in a 
westerly direction a small stream of lava had issued forth. Manuka 
bushes and ferns cover the slopes of the hill , between them the Euro- 
pean high-taper rears its slender shaft. The stately plant with its 
bright leaves and its pure yellow blossoms looked quite strange 
amongst the gloomy, monotonous New Zealand vegetation. An ob- 
server, however ignorant of the geography of plants, would neces- 
sarily recognize the foreigner at first sight. 
The Takapuna is very remarkable for the numerous lava-drops, 
or volcanic bombs, found on its surface, bombs of the most regular 
pear or lemon-shape with spiral points, which must have been 
formed by the rotation of the glowing masses thrown out in a 
fluid state. The interior structure of the lava-drops is dense and 
brittle like cooled cast-iron. They arc found of all sizes: small 
like a lemon, and others 3 or 4 feet long with a thickness of 
2 feet and a weight of several hundred pounds. Those bombs 
could have been only cast after the point of eruption had already 
risen above the level of the sea. This being quite a novelty to 
our Auckland friends , and it being moreover the intention to have 
some very characteristic specimens of such bombs deposited in the 
Auckland Museum, each of us took one of them on his shoulder, 
and thus heavily laden we returned to our tents. 
The natives we met on our way, stopped in per- 
fect amazement , and we heard one of them 
whisper to another the word “Kaura,” i. e. gold, 
which was quite amusing to us. Of course, what 
could those children of nature know about vol- 
canic bombs? They naturally reasoned, that 
gold alone could induce us to bear those heavy clods in the sweat 
of our brows for a whole hour. 
On arriving at our tents we found behind a bulwark con- 
structed of lava-blocks a gaily blazing fire, over which the tea- 
Volcanic bombs. 
