New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1859-03-30
SANDWICH ISLANDS.
GREAT VOLCANIC ERUPTION.


HoNOLULU, Feb 5 $50.
The yer5 k;est news-Of which, indeed, We have
10. YET fall psrtculirs-is tia: Msuns Los las
again broken out in volcanic eruption.
AL accounts represent i! as the most magnificent
that has occurred in our islands within present
memory. The heavens ~ hight sire fully illumi
mated for hundreds Of miles around, sl1 the sea is
liz up with long, slAnting beams The smoke has
been sen,iby peTcepti6le here, al 3 distance Oftwo
hundred miles 70 winiTarI, and the light dr.
cerned. ont At Maui, distant hslf way 10 Hawaii,
the illumination hiss been splendid. As spectator
informed me- il was Ike the blaze of e matched
hOuse within stones throw
The premoniti0n Of an unWOnted event seems TO
have been in shoals Of fish floating dead of Maui
and Hawaii as reported by Capt. DOws Of the
clipper ship Henry Brigham, snd on the 10Th nit.
By the passengers per Manuokawai. This would
indicate submarine eruption az the first. On the
23d nit the people Of HO observed in the after
noon an appearance OF smoke in the direction Of
the great flow Of l-jj, but owing to the clouds
which commonly skirt the mountain at that time
of day. nothing was then ascertalned. but shortly
after o'clock Of that evening the clouds dispersed
and left TO view the great spectacle OF an eruption
Of the first magnitude
imnense character and is running With fearful rapidy
So indeed Ea. by miinight The sys vac scursd %
have flowed dopn az least thirty mlsg. And Il mast
be added 10 this esnate Of IFS magnitude that {
spread by more than ore stream and in different III
IectlOrs not all visible 10 one observer for the Nd
wAhae people, on the opposite side Of the Island, saw
three streams or two Of which ceased bciog 80
sorbed perhaps IL valleys or diverted from their
eight. Tne bresdth Of these flows msy vary from one
10 FIVE miles Upcu the 18th the force Of the eruption
had in wise abs.ed. Il was thought 20 have even
reach ed the woods, Which ekirt tia mountain in
breadth of twenty miles, and TO have nearly to
the base of Nouns Kes.'
Asyet both sides Of the island think themselves
threatened with the fate which in lc5j and 1870
hung so long over Hilo when the lava, after a
course of 60 miles, continued steadily to push for
ward its destructive front through the dense woods
TIL within SIX miles Of the town. This present
eruption much exceeds that in yigOr, and should it
take the path now laid open, It's course seward
will be rapid indeed.
This Mauna Loa on the Hawaii. the most mod
ern island of the group, Is the latest formed OF Ha
waits mountains, and is yet incomplete. Viewing
il from IllO. il presents the outline of bow slightly
bent and at that distance, 50 regular an arc does
IL really rugged outline appear, that an artist who
should truly represent il would be thought not 10
have copied nature Ii appears to be long, hence
It's name L0a. But viewing it from Waimea, on
the right from Kona, opposite, and from kau on
the left of HO, our mountain presents nowhere
its end. and then you conceive that il is an i'm.
meIse dome. That seemingly low arch is the high
est Of Pacific Ocean mountains. But il is yet in
it, giant youth. Every new eruption accumulates
new masses upon It's broad crown. So that the
process Of eruption is not depicting one by which
the mountain throws ont its own bowels, but one
of building mp, out of materials drawn from depths
so deep and reservoirs vast, that this vast base
of a mountain is but nipple on the outlet of its
dIschargng vent.
From what abysms this heavy molten hud is
forced, and by what omnipotent energy We cannot
tell; not, indeed, may believe, from the surface
and crust Of the earth, but rather from the center
and that all rs Interior sphere Is such as this, which
is for our safety vented by volcanoes.
Here in the city great interest is felt in this
exhibition 0fndture, audseyeral vessels have already
sailed for Havana with some OF our most intelligent
observers, and with one or two gentlemen travelling
on scientific commission for the Austrian Govern
mcut