Cleveland daily leader. [volume] ([Cleveland, Ohio]) 1865-1873, 1866-05-25
SUBLIME SPECTACLE.
A Column of Fire one Thousand Feet
in Height, and a River OF Flame
ThIrIy.fIve Miles Long.


Thirty.nve Miles Long.
A Jet of lava of more stupendous pro
portions than any ever conceived Of, is
described by Mr.. Coan in the Honolulu
Friend of February, in his account of the
eruption of Mauna Loa, on the Island of
Hawaii
1.-THE eruption commenced near the
summit of the mountain, and only five or
six miles southeast of the eruption ofls43.
For two days this summit crater sent
down its burning floods along the north
eastern slope of the mountain; then sud-
denly the vale closed, and the great furnS
ace apparently ceased blast. After thirty
six hours the fusia was seen bursting out
of the eastern side of the mountain, about
midway from the top of the base.
1t would seem that the summit lava had
found a subterranean tunnel, for, halfway
down the mountain, when coming to a
weak point, or meeting with some OBJ
struction, it burst up vertically, sending
a column of incandescent fusia one thous-
and feet high into the air. This fire jet
was about one hundred feet in diameter,
and wBs sustained for twenty days and
nights, varying in height from one hun
dred to a thousand feet. The disgorge-
ment from the mountain-side was often
with terrific explosions, which shook the
hills, and with detonstions which were
heard for forty miles. This column Of
liquid fire was an object of surprising
brilliancy, of intense and awful grandeur.
As the let issued from the awful orifce, it
was white heat. As it ascended higher
and higher, it Redeemed like fresh blood,
deepening its color; until, in its descent,
much of it assumed the color of clotted
gore.
In few days it had raised q cone some
three hundred feet high around the burn
ing orifce, and IS the showers of burning
minerals fell in livid torrents upon tho
cone, it became one vast heap of glowing
Goals, flashing and quivering with restless
action, and sending out the heat of ten
thousand furnaces in full blast. The
struggles in disgorging the fiery masses,
the upward rush of the column, the force
which raised it one thousand vertical feet,
and the continuous falling back of the
thousands of tons of mineral fusia into the
throat Of the crater, and over cone of
glowing minerals, one mile in cireumfer-
ence, was sight to inspire awe and terror,
attended with explosive shocks which
seemed to rend the mural ribs of the
mountain, and sounds to waken the dead
and startle the spirits in Hades. From
this fountain q river of fire went rushing
and leaping down the mountain with
amazing velocity, filling up basins and
ravines, dashing over precipices, and ex-
ploding rocks, until it reached the forests
at the base of the mountain, where it
burned its fiery way, consuming the jun
gle, evaporating the water of the streams
and pools, cutting down the trees and
sending up clouds of smoke and steam
and murky columns of feecy wreaths to
heaven.
All Eastern Hawaii was a sheen of
light, and our night was turned into day.
So great was our illumination at night
that one could read without lamp, and
labor, travelling and recreation might go
on as in tho daytime Mariners at sea
saw the light at 200 miles distance. 1t
was a pyrotechnical display, more mag
nihcent and marvellous than was ever
made by any earthly monarch.
In the daytime the atmosphere for
thousands of square miles would be filed
with murky haze, through which the
sunbeams shed a pale and sickly light.
Smoke, steam, gases, ashes, cinders-furn-
ace or capilliary-foated in the air, some
times spreading out like fan, sometimes
careering in swift currents upon the wind,
or gyrating in ever changing colors in it-
full breezes. The point from which the
sa Nar nd faak
above the level of the sea, thus making
the igneous pillar distinct object of OBJ
along the whole eastern coast of
Hawaii.
During the eruption the writer made
an excursion to the source. After three
days of hard struggling in the jangle and
over fields, ridges and hills of bristling
scoria, he arrived near sunset at the scene
of action. All night long he stood as
near to the glowing pillar as the vehe-
ment heat would allow, listening TO the
startling explosions and the awful roar of
the molten column, as it rushed upward
thousand feet, and fell backward in fiery
avalanche which made the mountain
tremble. It was such a scene as few
mortnls ever witnessed. There was no
sleep for the spectator. The fierce, red
glare, the subterraneous mutterings and
strugglings, the rapid explosions of gasses,
the rushes and roar, the sudden and start
ling bursts as ofcrashing thunder-all, all
were awe-inspiring, and all combined to
render the scene one of INDISPENSABLE bril-
liancy and of terrible sublimity, The
rivers of fire from the fountain flowed
about thirty-fve miles, and stopped with
in ten miles of Hilo. Had the fountain
played ten days longer, it would probably
have reached the shore.