What I saw on the west coast of South and North America, and at the Hawaiian Islands.: By H. Willis Baxley, M.D.

RETURN TO HIILO.
island, to a wide floor of rock over which flows a branch of the
river when, from floods, it cannot empty its accumulated wa ters through the arch of the natural bridge and breaks over it,
filling this as well as its customary low-water channel. At such
times another cataract is formed by this southern branch of the
river, of greater height than that already described.
Looking from this upper terrace at the bold scenery at our
feet, and the beauty of that mellowed by distance, as it lay clad
in the " essential vesture of Creation," the heart cannot withhold
its reverence from Him who said, " Let the waters under the
heavens be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry
land appear," and who shaped and is still fashioning these by
such wondrous agencies, that finite manl trembles even at the
threshold of His revelations.
Some Hilo friends coming by a nearer route met us at the
Lauiole Fall, and curiosity having been gratified we bade adieu
to the wild valley of the Wailuku. Slipping, sliding, tripping,
and tramping through wood and marsh, deemed by the ladies
of the party "perfectly awful," but in truth very tolerable for a
patient pedestrian, compared with the pathless forest and jungle
in which we had wandered the day before, we came to a branch
of the Wailuku River, which as a limpid streamlet had furnished
our beverage as it bubbled from its aqueduct beneath the field
of lava we had visited, and whichl now, after miles of meandering and gathering of tributary rivulets, was again met, no longer
a mere brook. It was the water of this stream that was kept
at a scalding temperature for months by the hot lava, with which
it was in constant contact during the eruption of 18.5, and into
which a native accidentally falling instantly perished. IHow
different its condition when crossed by us! Cool, placid, transparent, seemingly a polished mirror, in which the coquettish
ferns overhanging its banks gazed admiringly at their reflected
beauty, that looked up from the crystal depths so bewitchingly
at our gentler companions borne across by a stalwart native,
that one might have fancied they sought to seduce these sister
spirits to dwell with them.
Half a mile further brought us to our awaiting horses, and
mounting into the saddle we hastened to Hilo in an unlooked
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