THE PRESENT APPEARANCE OF THE LOCALITY.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XII, Issue 1735, 16 June 1886, Page 2

THE PRESENT APPEARANCE OF THE LOCALITY.

Heavy masses of. steam ' and black . smoke directed the way un.mistakeably to the high hill overlooking Rotamahana, and pushing forward wo flo6n*un«ounled the last peak and stood looking down upon the most extraordinary spectacle imagination can conceive. Where the lake formerly existed th»re was nothing now visible but a series of craters m full activity, and belching out stones every few minutes. I counted eleven of these craters on the tide of the lake immediately below V qar'ifceiraod^ heavy masses of smotte and steam hindered further view of the lake, but .there it no doubt that other crater" were m play further towards the centre, and that if the water was not entirely driven out of the lake, it had become a great boiling cauldron. Where the. beautiful Pink Terrace stood one of the largest of these craters was m full play, . but the fate of the terrace itself could only be conjectured. Prom the forces at work within and around it, the nature, of that fate can hardly ibe m? doubt. 'The) ?ron;-> dcrof the world and tha delight oftourists has beyond all reasonable .doubt been driven into dust and fine ashes. To Tarate, the White Terrace; we could not see, b,ut battered at on every side, its fate cannot be different f roui that of its beautiful sister. After watching with feelings of sorrow this spectacle of destructive forces engaged m sending into f ragmeuts the artistic work built up m Nature's labatory operating through centuries, we turqied our facesonce more towards the camp;- v The prospect obtained from this, hill was most extensive and varied .viFar-;away beyond Taupo was seen ihe snow-clad! cone of fiuapehu and her sister Toagpriro with a light column of steam issu- ' ing from Ngaruhoe, the active point of Tongariro. Nearer, the steam jets and the green fern hills around Wairoa* then Kakaramea and Okaro Lake immediately beneath our feet, so that a. clip on the hillside might roll us into - ;©ne of the roaring craters, the violent turmoil oft ttotomahana, and along ithe bed of the old creek the other four active craters, already described:- '"All the way. towards the Wairoa were hills clothed' m mud, and beneath; 'them Tarawera Lake, calm and peaceful, - with. the dark outline of the great mountain itself visible through the^Bteam and smoke From Rotomahana towards .£ake Okaro and back to Rerewhakaitu fctie bills • of dust and ashes were visible m unbroken continuity, covering an area of not less than seven square miles, m the. other direction;' towards the illfated Wairoa villages, was' the deposit of wet mud, which was undoubtedly .projected out of the bed . >bjb4j.alre ' SotbmahatiaTl ... This innd deppßikcdf ers a larcer area^baffr the dus"^ ofj properly spefl^ifig^rwhite earth. Fro&.Eibto^hana' toWairpa is at least sevejfr miles m a direct line, arid to the limiti q>f the mud deposit towards Ohineurotp is*at leafßt 'Of. ' Its' line estends also,6vet.to Kaiteririai and' also m the opposite direction along; the. shores of Rotorua Lake-t^lPakehe. The^extent of country thus^b^fiwdi^being 10, or! 20 miles m length with an average* breadtn of 10 or 12. The ( depth with the proximity to tht? Joint of eruption and the drift of wind, but it must represent a tovKrage jvhich^one' •hesitates^© place m, figures: Ttfe mu4 is xezy? heavy, khfl toits great weight the catastrophe of Wairoa and 68 ar P attributable* ''Whetber^fchißi^r area of l^irid will be made a desert by 'the eruption, or whether vegetatipn will re-appear is a question for the future 'to decide, but meanwhile it is rendered ibtally*mcapable 6t sustaining' animal' life, and, the dead bodies of rats which are seen every where, on its sjoffecp show that even' the rodent find^it iinppssiWe'to gain a subsistence m the vast wilderness which has been created m a single night. - • '