ARRIVAL AT KEAVAITI. 
187 
present confusion by some violent convulsion of 
the earth. 
From the state of the lava covering that part of 
the country through which we have passed, we 
should be induced to think that eruptions and 
earthquakes had been, almost without exception, 
concomitants of each other; and the shocks must 
have been exceedingly violent, to have torn the 
lava to pieces, and shaken it up in such distorted 
forms as we every where beheld. 
Slabs of lava, from nine to twelve inches thick, 
and from four to twenty or thirty feet in diameter, 
were frequently piled up edgewise, or stood lean¬ 
ing against several others piled up in a similar 
manner. Some of them were six, ten, or twelve 
feet above the general surface, fixed in the lava 
below, which appeared to have flowed round 
their base, and filled up the interstices occa¬ 
sioned by the separation of the different pieces. 
One side of these rugged slabs generally pre¬ 
sented a compact, smooth, glazed, and gently 
undulated surface, while the other appeared 
rugged and broken, as if torn with violence from 
the viscid mass to which it had tenaciously ad¬ 
hered. Probably these slabs were raised by the 
expansive force of the heated air beneath the sheet 
of lava. 
After about eighteen miles of most difficult 
travelling, they reached Keavaiti , a small opening 
among the rocks, where, in case of emergency, 
a canoe might land in safety. Here they found 
Mr. Harwood and myself waiting; for, after leav¬ 
ing Kapua, we had sailed along close to the shore, 
till the wind, becoming too strong for us to pro¬ 
ceed, we availed ourselves of the opening which 
Keavaiti afforded, to run the canoe ashore, and 
