The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1881-08-27
The State OF the Lava Flow.
Hilo Saved-D Disappointed Tour
lists.
KlLAUEA AND NIAGARA

Hilo has not been engulphed. and overiown
with iava-to provide a Pompeii or an Her.
oaleaneuul FOR Hawaiian exhumors Of AID. 1881.
However. there would not have been much Of
Hilo for the observation of future excavators IL
Madame Pele had taken the matter seriously in
hand. There would not probably have been a
splinter found to mark the sites Of temples Of
Christian faith, or Of Justice or the mansions
Of a Coan, Il Severance. a Lyman, or a genial
Captain Tom Spencer or Of any other relic Of
the fair tropic city, seated on its hillside Of
beauty. had the lava come down in earnest.
The great fre-mountain, after belching forth
red hot molten lava, that amounted in volume
to an area ten miles square, and several hundred
feet high-or about the extent Of Kahoolawe-
after running over sixty miles in its course, and
after flowing to Il point where it had not flowed
before perhaps in a thousand years-stopped
short within eight hundred yards of Hilo. Why
it stopped cannot be answered by any science,
OF observation Of man. Some will believe in
the efficacy OF prayer in this instance and let
not anyone, who knows no more than the be-
leving, endeRVor to unsettle the assurances Of
faith. However, the wonderful dow has stopped,
much to the inexpressible relief and delight OF
Hlloites, and of all the country. with the excep-
ton of some tourists who missed the conhagra.
ton they went TO see. To witness a city over
whelmed by "A volcano has not been observed.
since the first century and il must have been
rather disappointing. when in the nineteenth
century o city was imminently threatened with
being overwhelmed, and the overwhelming did
not come of. However, recent tourists TO the
lava flow have been compensated by the wit.
Messing of n great many volcanic sights and
demonstrations, and, like nearly all visitors TO
volcanic phenomena, have to relate a series OF
hair-breadth escapes, evidences of their daring.
hardihood and endurance-such as looking into
hell-like blow holes with lava Jets dropping
around the person like a fiery hail on a burning
plain or springing from a ledge just as Il
crumbled down into a seething cauldron OF in
candescence on leeping "A fiery chasm whilst
sulphurous fumes seorched of side-whiskers or
crossing a red hot crust of a recent flow, aud
burning on boot soles. These are some Of the
experiences compensating tourists for missing
the confagration and overwhelming of n city.
1t would have afforded an interesting prominence
in "A mans history TO have it said OF him "He
saw the last of Hilo.' But il was not TO be
and Hilo must fulfill It's mission Of providing, az
it is earnestly hoped, by hotel OF otherwise for
successive hordes of tourists that shall o
from the farthest ends of the earth to see how
near she was being swallowed up.
The lava flow from Mokuaweoweo to Hilo OF
1881 is now a CONCEALED stream throughout its
length and should "A fresh outburst of the
volcano take place at the same vent, II would
have to find a new channel. The late flow OF lava
is now a tortuous line of petrifaction, with ex-
traordinary crevasses and caverns throughout its
entire length and in two or three years all this
surface of gnarled twisted and aernantfna o,,r
face will be covered with lichens, mosses, and
ferns preparing the way for q fuller development
of vegetation and all the ragged-edged crypts,
chasms, and recesses along the burning route
will, in a little while, be fringed and adorned
with a lovely vegetation, SO that the daintiest
feet may tread there, and the loveliest hands be
delighted in culling the choice cryptograms OF
these isles. The most of the surface OF grand vol
canic Hawaii especially that Of Puma, Kau, and
Kona-presents a variety of curiously-contrived
grots, caves, channels and interstices produced
by volcanic action. There are no doubt many
subterranean caves, miles in extent, yet TO be
discovered and in some certain arcana Of Ha-
waiian history may be revealed TO a great his
toric and ethnic student, and jealous exhumer,
like Schliemann.
But great Pele is not dead. She has not
finished her work on Hawaii, Her everlasting
caldron still boils at KilaU =. And il may be
said go and see Kilauea, and call Vesuvius a
tar kiln. The mighty bass Of the roar OF Hale
maumau will ring and intone in your ears, when
the rythm of Niagara is forgotten. The cataract
is of the earth's surface, merely n leap and q roar;
but our volcano is the pulsation Of the planet,
a surging jet from earth's artery and casting
heavenwaTd its gouts Of gore, a thousand feet
and more.