There are eleven volcanoes in Celebes, and six in Flores, all active.
It is still uncertain whether the conical mountain Wawari, or Atiti, which is more generally known as the volcano of the island of Amboyna, ever poured out anything except hot mud (1674), or whether it should be merely classed as a solfatara. The main group of the South Asiatic Islands is connected through the Moluccas and the Philippines with the Papua and Pellew islands, and the Caroline Archipelago of the South Sea.
The most important geological fact to be remarked with reference to the island of Formosa, abounding in mineral coals, is the break in the line of direction of the open vents, when, instead of N.E. to S.W., the central line follows the meridian line, which it pursues nearly as far as 6° S., passing through Formosa and the Philippine Islands (Luzon and Mindanao), respecting which deviation nothing certain is known, and in which region every mountain of conical shape, or outline is invariably set down as a volcano, even though there should be no indications of a crater. The Sooloo Archipelago forms the connecting link between the islands of Borneo and Mindanao, the long, narrow island of Palawan, constituting that between Borneo and Mindoro.
The Island of Yesso, separated from that of Niphon by the Straits of Sangar, or Tsugar, and from the islands of Krafto (Saghalien) and Tschoka, or Tarakai, by the Straits of La Pérouse, connects, through its North Eastern Cape, with the archipelago of the Kuriles. From Broughton's Southern Vulcan Bay up to its northernmost point, Yesso is traversed by an uninterrupted range of volcanoes—a fact the more worthy of being recorded, as in the expedition of La Pérouse there were found red porous lavas, as well as wide areas, covered with slags, in the Baie des Castries, in the narrow island of Krafto (Saghalien), which is, as it were, merely a continuation of Yesso. In our own day these regions command a higher interest, from a political point of view, more especially since Russia, dissatisfied with the situation of Okhotsk, at the sanded mouth of the Amoor, was anxious, after the destruction of Petropaulowski, on the coast of Kamtschatka, to obtain, on the S.E. coast, a harbour suitable for a military station.
Among the three islands which form the main portion of the Japanese Empire, six volcanoes are known to have had eruptions in the historic period. The volcano, Fusi Jama, in Niphon, province of Suruga (Lat. 35° 18′ N., Long. 136° 15′ E., altitude 11,675 feet), is said to have risen out of the plain 286 years before the Christian era. Its last eruption was in 1707. The volcano, Asama Jama, in the district of Saku, between the meridians of the two capitals, Miaco and Jeddo, was last in eruption in 1783. On the island of Kiusiu, adjoining the peninsula of Corea, four volcanoes are situated, from one of which, called Wanzen, there was a most destructive eruption in 1793.
The beautiful work of Commodore Perry, U.S.N., detailing his mission to Japan, on the part of the United States Government, in 1852, containing excellent photographs of races, as also drawings by the Berlin artist, Wilhelm Heine, does not, as yet, comprise the scientific results of that expedition.
Proceeding northwards, the volcanoes are more densely crowded, and are found arranged in series. Of the fifty-four which I enumerated as still in activity among the islands of Eastern Asia, there are thirty-four on the Aleutian, and ten on the Kurile Islands. The Peninsula of Kamtschatka contains nine volcanoes, which have been in activity within the historic period. Lying under the 54th and 60th degrees of northern latitude, we see a long strip of sea-bottom between two continents undergoing a perpetual process of destruction and re-arrangement.
The South Sea, the superficial extent of which is one-sixth greater than that of the entire solid crust of our planet, actually presents a smaller number of active volcanoes, less vents for communication between the centre of the earth and its atmospheric envelope, than the single Island of Java! Out of 40 volcanic cones, including those which are extinct, only 26 have been seen in eruption during the historic period. They are not scattered at random, but, on the contrary, as was pointed out by Mr. James Dana, the ingenious geologist of the great United States Exploring Expedition, under the command of Capt. Wilkes (1838-42), they have been thrown up, at widely extending clefts, communicating by submarine mountain systems. They are arranged in groups and distinct regions, analogous to the mountain chains of Central Asia and Armenia (in the district of the Caucasus), and belong to two quite distinct systems, one running S.E. to N.W., the other S.S.W. to N.N.E.
In the Hawaiian Archipelago (or Sandwich Island group), we find Mauna Loa, according to Wilkes, 12,900 feet in height, which does not present any cone of volcanic scoriæ (resembling, in this particular, the volcanoes of the Eifel), but has emitted streams of lava. The lava basin of Killauea, 13,000 feet in its greatest, by 4800 in its smallest diameter, is not a solfatara, but a true lateral vent on the flank of the powerful Mauna Loa itself, exactly resembling the less elevated sheet of lava of Arak. Mauna Kea is 180 feet higher than Mauna Loa, but is extinct. Tafoa and Amangura, in the Tonga group, are still in eruption, the last discharge of lava having occurred in July, 1847. The volcano of Tanna was in full eruption during Capt. Cook's Voyage of Discovery in 1774, as was also the volcano of Ambrym, west of Malicollo in the archipelago of the New Hebrides. At the south point of New Caledonia, lies Matthew's Rock, a small smoking rocky island. The volcano of Santa Cruz, N.N.W. of Tina Kora, with periodical eruptions occasionally occurring at intervals of 10 minutes, had been already noticed as a volcano by Mendana, so far back as 1595. In the Salomon Archipelago, there is found the volcano of Sesarga, while others are said to be in full activity in the Marianas or Ladrones, just like those of Guguan, Pagon, and El Volcan Grande de Asuncion, which appear to have broken forth along a line that follows the meridian. In New Britannia, three conical mountains were observed vomiting streams of lava, by Tasman, Carteret, and Labillardière. There are two volcanoes in full activity on the north-east coast of New Guinea, opposite Admiralty Islands, which themselves are so rich in obsidian. In New Zealand, numerous regions abound in basaltic and trachytic rocks. Of active volcanoes there are Puhia-i-Wakati (the volcano of White Island), and the lofty cone of Tongariro (5816 feet). To the absence of centres of volcanic agency in New Caledonia, where sedimentary formations and seams of coal have recently been discovered, is ascribed the vast development of coral reefs. Dana was the first to ascend the Peak of Tafua, in the Island of Upolu, one of the Samoa group, not to be confounded with the still active volcano of Tafoa, south of Amangura, in the Tonga Archipelago. Dana found in it a crater overgrown with thick forest. So, too, on the isolated Vaihu or Easter Island group, there is found a range of conical mountains with craters, but inactive.
Of the volcanic groups of the South Sea, the most violent is the farthest east, adjoining the shores of the New World, viz., the archipelago of the Gallipagos, which consists of five considerable islands, very admirably described by Darwin. There are streams of lava down to the very shore of the sea, but no pumice. Some of the trachytic lavas are said to abound with crystals of albite. It is important to examine whether or not this is oligoclase, as on Teneriffe, Popocatepetl, and Chimborazo; or labradorite, as on Etna and Stromboli. Palagonite, exactly similar to that of Iceland or in Italy, was discovered by Bunsen in the specimens of tufa from Chatham Island, one of the Gallipagos.