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THE GEOLOGY OF AUCKLAND. 29

cinders and ashes, I often slid down again several feet. There
was no snow on the cone of the mountain, unless in some cre-
vices to which the sun's rays did not penetrate. There was not
on the cone any vegetation, not even the long wiry grass which
grows in scanty patches up to the very base of the cone. The
ascent of the cone took me, I should think, four hours at least;
but as I had no watch, it is possible from the laborious occupa-
tion I was at, that the ascent of the cone looked longer than it
was. But whether it was three or four hours I was clambering
up the cone I recollect I hailed with delight the mouth of the
great chimney up which I had been toiling. The sun had just
begun to dip, and I thought it might be around 1 p.m., so that I
had ascended the mountain from the Rotoaire lake in about
eight hours. I must confess, as I had scarcely any food with
me, that I kept pushing on at a good pace. On the top of
Tongariro I expected to behold a magnificent prospect, but the
day was now cloudy, and I could see no distance. The crater is
nearly circular, and from afterwards measuring with the eye a
piece of ground about the same size, I should think it was six
hundred yards in diameter. The lip of the crater was sharp:
outside there was almost nothing but loose cinders and ashes;
inside of the crater there were large overhanging rocks of a pale
yellow colour, evidently produced by the sublimation of sulphur.
The lip of the crater is not of equal height all round, but I think
I could have walked round it. The southern side is the highest,
and the northern, where I stood, the lowest. There was no
possible way of descending the crater. I stretched out my neck
and looked down the fearful abyss which lay gaping before me,
but my sight was obstructed by large clouds of steam or vapour,
and I don't think I saw thirty feet down. I dropped into the
crater several large stones, and it made me shudder to hear some
of them rebounding as I supposed from rock to rock - of some
of the stones thrown in I heard nothing. There was a low
murmuring sound during the whole time I was at the top, such
as you hear at the boiling springs at Rotomahana and Taupo,
and which is not unlike the noise heard in a steam engine room
when the engine is at work. There was no eruption of water
or ashes during the time I was there, nor was there any appear-
ance that there had been one lately. I saw no lava which had