SAKURASHIMA.

Mataura Ensign, 26 January 1914, Page 6

SAKURASHIMA.

1 ■ ■ DESCRIPTION OF THE CJRATER. M. Pelletier, a"" French gentleman now resident in Sydney, was in Japan a couple of years ago, and actually entered: the crater o,f Sakurashima, which is the centre of the big volcanic disturbance reported from Japan. He went from Tokio, and travelled right down through the southern island of Kirashiu, and stayed about a week in Kagoshima, where bo inspected the celebrated Satsuma factory. He made an. excursion to the island of Sakurashima. The island can be reached from the mainland by means of the small steamer that calls at some of the small; towns on tho island, or by means of: junks or sampans—native craft. | When he landed he noticed that even on tho beach, if a hole were dug in the sand, the water flowing into it was warm. He s;uv many of the natives bathing in holes they had scooped in the sand l —having hot baths. To reach | the mountain, which is about 4000 ft high, M. Pelletier passed through villages anil plantations until he readied the foot of the big slope. Thence onward the path was very steep. The side of the mountain is covered with luxuriant vegetation, which gives place, when a couple of hundred yards from the top, to coarse tussocky grass, some of which was actually growing inside the crater, showing that there had been no great emission from the volcano for some length of time. The view from the summit of the mountain ; is magnificent in all directions. | The crater gave M. Pelletier the im- 1 pression of being about 800 ft to 1000 ft ; deep, and it is about three-quarters .of: a mile in diameter. Ho descended into the crater to take some photographs, j At the bottom of the crater there were' some cracks in the ground, and some; liquid lava was percolating through < n heap of stone and' flowing into a sort of, cup, from which it overflowed and ran 1 in little streams,, cooling as it went! till it became sluggish and finally; stopped. At the time of his visit this j voloano, which had been quiescent for■ 130 years, was rumbling deeply every J few minutes, and small internal ex-, plosions caused, at times, stones to fall from the sides of the crater. On the topi of the mountain he saw the spear; which, according to a legend, had been ■ planted in the ground bv a sun goddess. Pilgrims to the top of tae mountain had < built a cairn around it—stones, piecef. : of wood, and metal, that they had car-! ried to the summit. j On the outer sides of the crater there were big drifts of loose scoria running: down for a considerable distance. There; are villages all around the island, the soil of which seems to be very rich, judging by the crops that -were Been. When M. Pelletier visited' Kagoshima there were a few European residents in the town, including a French teacher. He happened to enter a Japanese stationer's shop, and was very interested, to find a large number of the books ; were in English—chiefly novels and t magazines. He found that there was a j ready sale for these among Japanese j I students who were learning English.