HERO ON A VOLCANO.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19254, 19 August 1924, Page 8

HERO ON A VOLCANO.

STIRRING TALE OF KILAUEA. MAN ON HEAVING LAVA. In the middle of the Pacific Ocean, a young man was recently saved from a terrible death by a brave deed. The young man is Mr Geoffrey H. Bushby, and, says a London paper, he is one of 360 people who were sailing round the world on the Empress of Canada. ' The vessel stopped at Hawaii and the company went ashore to look at the famous crater of Kilauea. Most of them stood on the outer edge looking into the enormous hollow of the crater. Mr Bushby, not content with seeing at a distance, had climbed down a cliff 535 ft deep into the cup of the volcano. With him was Mr Augustus D. Curtis, o£ Chicago, who stopped on a ledge to take photographs. Mr Bushby went on a little farther, and crossed- the quiet lava beds to peer into the very mouth of the volcano. Suddenly a terrific growl rose out of the volcano’s heart. It seemed as if the monster was angry. A cloud of smoke arose, and after it came a sheet of fire, its glow filling the crater and its heat rising to tjie outer edge where the 300 tourists stood in horror. As they stared down they saw the lava bed begin to heave, and across it they saw, staggering, the form of Mr Bushby. Over these waves of solid matter, sinking and rising under his feet, with a sheet of red light, it seemed, thrown round him, the young man made his way as best he might. Before he got to the cliff he was overcome with smoke, and he fell at the foot of the rocky wall. Five hundred feet of hard climbing lay between him and safety. Behind him fell the first showers of lava. The spectators, peering through the smoke, then saw a sight that made their hearts stand still. Mr Curtis, a man nearly 60, was climbing Sown this terrible wall. He reached the foot of the cliff lifted Bushby, and began to climb bade again, with the smoke and lire growing thicker about him. For some distance this brave men carried the unconscious figure up the cliff. Before he had got half way, two young men, one a captain in the Norwegian army and the other a Hawaiian soldier, had scrambled down to meet him. One took Mr Bushby and the other helped the gallant old gentleman up into safety again. The Empress of Canada, carrying with her one of the bravest of heroes, sailed away, with the volcano, an angry, spitting monster, oii her horizon line.