"About noon the falling lava disclosed the fact that the small extension at the right of the lake was only eighty feet deep, and it was soon left high and dry; simply a great shelf in the bank, high up above the surface of the lake. As the lava fell, most of the surrounding banks were seen to be slightly over hanging, and as the lateral support of the molten lava was withdrawn, great slices of the over-hanging banks on all sides of the lake would suddenly split off and fall into the lake be neath.
"As these falls took place the exposed surface, sometimes a hundred feet across and upwards, would be left red-hot, the break evidently having taken place on the line of a heat-crack which had extended down into the lake.
"About six o'clock the fallen bank adjacent to the hill worked back into a territory which, below fifty feet from the surface, was all hot and in a semi-molten condition. From six to eight o'clock the entire surface of this bluff, some eight hundred feet in length and over two hundred feet in height, was a shifting mass of color, varying from the intense light of molten lava to all the varying shades of rose and red to black, as the dif ferent portions were successively exposed by a fall of rock and then cooled by exposure to the air. During this period the crash of the falling banks was incessant. Sometimes a great mass would fall forward like a wall ; at others it would simply collapse and slide down making red-hot fiery land slides, and again enormous boulders, as big as a house, singly and in groups, would leap from their fastenings and, all aglow, chase each other clown and leap far out into the lake. The awful grandeur and terrible magnificence of the scene at this stage are indescribable. As night came on, and yet hotter recesses were uncovered, the molten lava which remained in the many caverns leading off through the banks to other por tions of the crater, began to run back and fall down into the lake beneath, making fiery cascades down the sides of the bluff. There were five such lava streams at one time.
"The light from the surface of the lake, the red-hot walls, and the molten streams lighted up the entire area, bringing out every detail with the utmost distinctness, and lighted up a tall column of Gust and smoke which rose straight up. Dur
ing the entire period of the subsidence the lava fountains upon the surface of the lake continued in action, precisely as though nothing unusual was taking place.
"Although the action upon the face of the subsiding area was so terrific, that upon the portion between the falling face and the outer line of fracture was so gradual, that an active man could have stood on almost any portion of it without injury. Enormous cracks, twenty to thirty feet deep, and from five to ten feet wide, opened in all directions upon its surface, and the subsidence was more rapid in some spots than in others, but in almost all cases the progress of action was gradual, although the shattered and chaotic appearance of the rocks made it look as though nothing but a tremendous con vulsion could have brought it about.
"Another noticeable incident was the almost entire absence of sulphurous vapors, no difficulty in breathing being expe rienced directly to leeward of the lake.
"At nine o'clock the next morning the lake was found to have sunk some twenty feet more : the banks at the right and left of the subsiding area, which had been the chief points of observation the day before, had disappeared into the lake for distances varying from twenty-five to one hundred feet back from the former edge, and the lower half of the debris slope had been swallowed up in the lake, disclosing the original smooth black wall of the lake beneath at a considerable over hanging angle.
"At the level of the lake, and half filled by it, was a great cavern extending in a southeasterly direction from the lake. The dimensions were apparently seventy-five feet across and fifteen feet from the surface of the lake to the roof of the cave. It could be looked into from the opposite bank for about fifty feet. This may have been the duct through which the lava had been drained, although it manifestly was not at the bot tom of the lake, for up to July i6th, that had continued to rise and fall from five to ten feet a day, and constantly threw up fountains, somewhat more actively than before its sub sidence. The entire area of subsidence is estimated to be a lit tle less than eight acres, about one-half of which fell into the lake.