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I had never sailed on the Pacific, or at least that part of it, before, and its wonders were strange to me. I had not seen coral islands, nor cocoanuts growing. It grieved me that I could not afford to stay in Honolulu and visit Kilauea. I only remained some hours, which I spent in prowling about the town, which is like a tenth-rate city in America.
The whole anatomy of the island is laid bare; the history and the growth of the peak are written in letters of lava, in wastes of pumice and fire-scarred walls. The plain of the Canyadas lies beneath me, and is ten miles across. This was the ancient crater; it is as big as the crater of Kilauea, in the Hawaiian Islands. But Kilauea is yet truly alive, a sea of lava with many cones spouting lava.
Kilauea never overflows its vast crater, but bursts a passage for its lava through the mountain side when relief is necessary, and then the destruction is fearful. About 1840 it rent its overburdened stomach and sent a broad river of fire careering down to the sea, which swept away forests, huts, plantations and every thing else that lay in its path.
An irruption of the great volcano of Kilauea, or an earthquake, always brings a deal of latent loyalty to the Great Shark God to the surface. It is common report that the King, educated, cultivated and refined Christian gentleman as he undoubtedly is, still turns to the idols of his fathers for help when disaster threatens.
It was magnificent sport. We wore ourselves out at it. The crater of Vesuvius, as I have before remarked, is a modest pit about a thousand feet deep and three thousand in circumference; that of Kilauea is somewhat deeper, and ten miles in circumference. But what are either of them compared to the vacant stomach of Haleakala?
First a new veil blew away, next my plaid was missing, then I passed my trunk on the ox-cart which should have been at the landing; but still though the heat was fierce, and the glare from the black lava blinding, I dashed heedlessly down, and in twenty minutes had ridden three miles down a descent of 2,000 feet, to find the Kilauea puffing and smoking with her anchor up; but I was in time, for her friendly clerk, knowing that I was coming, detained the scow.
The direction given me on leaving Kapapala was, that after the natives left me I was to keep a certain crater on the south-east till I saw the smoke of Kilauea; but there were many craters.
This notable flow finally ceased within half a mile of Hilo, where its black form is a perpetual reminder of a marvellous deliverance from destruction. Kilauea seems never, in historic times, to have filled and overflowed its vast crater. To do so would need an almost inconceivable volume of liquid rock material.
Severance suggested that it would be much better for me to follow the Hawaiian fashion, and ride astride, and put his saddle on the horse. It was only my strong desire to see the volcano which made me consent to a mode of riding against which I have so strong a prejudice, but the result of the experiment is that I shall visit Kilauea thus or not at all.
Holes and caves that abound in the lava old craters, bubbles, and steam-vents also have their stories. On Kauai they show a series called Pele's Jumps, because when the fire-goddess was driven from that island by the water-gods she made three long steps in the soft crust before undertaking the final leap that landed her on the slope of Kilauea. Each of these pits would hold a hotel.
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