APPENDIX II.
Extracts from the Sydney Daily Press relating to the recent eruption of Mount Tarawera.
Sydney Morning Herald, Friday, June 11th, 1886.
Intelligence was received here early this morning from Rotorua, stating that a terrible volcanic disturbance had taken place at Mount Tarawera. The residents of Rotorua passed a fearful night. The earth had been in a continual state of quaking since midnight. At ten minutes past two this morning the first heavy shock of earthquake occurred. It was accompanied by a fearful subterranean roar, which caused the greatest alarm to the residents, who immediately ran out of their houses. A grand yet terrible sight met their gaze. Mount Tarawera, which is in close proximity to Rotomahana, suddenly became an active volcano, and from the summit of the mountain immense volumes of flame belched forth to a great height. Streams of lava ran down the sides of the mountain.
The eruption appears to have extended itself to several places southward.
Dense masses of ashes came pouring down in the neighbourhood of the settlement at Rotorua at 4 a.m., accompanied by a suffocating smell, which rose from the lower regions of the earth. An immense black cloud of ashes hung like a pall over the country for miles round, extending in a line from Taheka to Wairoa.
At 3 a.m., a terrific report aroused the sleeping inhabitants of Taupo. An immense glare of a pillar-shaped light was observed to the N.N.E., and a great black cloud hung over this pillar. It was concave on the underside and convex on the upper, whilst meteors shot out from
