Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 6.djvu/429

423 JOURNAL AND LETTERS OF DAVID DOUGLAS. 423 and seventy feet high, preferring this course to the very steep ascent of the South side, which consists entirely of loose ashes and scoriae, and we gained the summit soon after ten. Though exhausted with fatigue before leaving the Table Land, and much tried with the in- creasing cold, yet such was my ardent desire to reach the top, that the last portion of the way seemed the easiest. This is the loftiest of the chimneys; a lengthened ridge of two hundred and twenty-one yards two feet, running nearly straight 1ST. W. To the North, four feet be- low the extreme summit of the Pea'k, the barometer was instantly suspended, the cistern being 1 exactly below, and when the mercury had acquired the temperature of the circumambient air, the following register was entered: at 11 hrs. 20 min.; bar. 18.362 inch.; air 33; hygr. /x 5 [?]. At twelve o'clock the horizon displayed some snowy clouds; until this period, the view was sublime to the greatest degree, but now every appearance of a mountain-storm came on. The* whole of the low S. E. point of the island was throughout the day covered like a vast plain of snow, with clouds. The same thermometer laid in the bare lava, and exposed to the wind at an angle of 27, expressed at first 37, and afterwards, at twelve o'clock, 41, though when held in the hand exposed to the sun, it did not rise at all. It may well be conjectured that such an immense mass of heating material, combined with the influence of internal fire, and taken in connexion with the insular position of Mouna Kuah, surrounded with an immense mass of water, will have the effect of raising the snow-line considerably, ex- cept on the northern declivity, or where sheltered by large blocks of lava, there was no snow to be seen; even on the top of the cairn, where the barometer was fixed, there were only a few handsful. One thing struck me as curious, the apparent non-diminution of sound; not as respects the rapidity of its transmission, whieh is, of course, subject to a well-known law. Certain it is, that on mountains of infe- rior elevation, whose summits are clothed with snow and ice, we find it ne^o ! ul to roar into one another's ears, and the firing of a gun at a short distance does not disturb the timid Antelope on the high snowy peaks of N, W. America. Snow is doubtless a non-conductor of sound, but there may be also something in the mineral substance of Mouna Kuah which would effect this. Until eleven o'clock, the horizon was beautifully defined on the whole N. W. of the island. The great dryness of the air is evident to the senses, without the assistance of the hygrometer. Walking with my trousers rolled up to my knees, and without shoes, I did not know there were holes in my stockings, till I was apprised of them by the scorching heat and pain in my feet, which continued throughout the day, the skin also peeled from my face. While on the summit I ex- perienced a violent head-ache, and my eyes became blood-shot, accom- panied with stiffness in their lids.