The detailed news from New Zealand of the volcanic erup-
tion which took place in the Lake District of the Northern Island on June 10th and the following days, shows that hardly anywhere of late years,—except, indeed, in Sumatra,—has a more destructive volcanic eruption taken place. It has not only resulted in the complete destruction of several Maori villages, with apparently all the inhabitants, and of several Europeans, but in such a break-up of the singular and exquisitely lovely country in the immediate neighbourhood of these hot lakes, that one of the most remarkable scenes on the earth's surface has probably disappeared for ever. We refer to the unique pink and white terraces which surround Lake Rotomahaua. Broad, flat, rounded terraces, like the tiers of an amphi- theatre, in white silica at one place, and in pink silica at another, rose tier above tier, the white terraces pure as Parian marble, and the pink terraces of various delicate shades of rose-colour, with stalactites of the same general hue. Over these terraces the hot water fell in cascades. They are, it is said, in a telegram dated Sunday, June 13th, utterly destroyed by the eruption which has made such wild work in that region. The official telegram says :—" The terraces are gone. The whole base occupied by them and by Roto- mahana is now a series of great volcanoes, and a grand and terrible spectacle. Huge boulders -and showers of ashes are being thrown up by them We could not see the site of the white terrace for smoke and steam ; but it cannot exist. The pink terrace looks as if it had fallen in." To New Zea- landers this must be something like such a calamity as the disap- pearance of the great range of Bernese Alps would be to Europe. It is the loss of one of the most singular and unique of the accessible glories of Nature in their world.
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