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XIX
Tarawera

Boom!
The enormous sound
  Came on the starlit silence of the night
And as the mighty wheel went thundering round
  The earth was shaken—stopped, the morning light.

It was a still cloudless night in' 85, a slight frost just stiffening the grass, and the clear New Zealand sky alight with big stars. From our sound sleep after a tiring day's work on the ran, we were suddenly awakened by an unusual noise. "One of those blanky dogs has got in the new tank," said a querulous and sleepy voice. There was a 200-gallon affair of sheet metal lying empty on its side. But as we really woke up, we found it more of a row than could come from the most resounding tin tank; we realised in fact that it was the biggest noise we had ever heard, or were likely again to hear. It was not like big guns, nor did it resemble thunder, it was more resonantly immense than either. It did not physically deafen or stun, but it was none the less mentally astounding for all that. We compared it, at the time, to page 139the clanking rumble of some inconceivably huge machine.

Of course we were all outside in no time, and staring North-West. There was, however, nothing to see; the night was as clear and still, and the stars as bright as ever, and this still peace only intensified the awed wonder with which we listened to the prodigious volume of sound. It could be but one thing, we knew, though just where, and how far off, we could only guess; and guess, in fact, we did to within a few miles. We were all wildly excited and interested, a little suppressed nervousness rather adding to the pleasure. But neither interest nor fear could keep us long out in the cold night, so we were soon all back to bed and most of us asleep. Later on, there was a pull and shove at my bed; it seemed to move several inches. Then followed frequent lesser jerks, while the local stillness came to an end in almost continuous lightning and thunder, violent wind and rain in torrents, the gigantic engine still grinding on. When I wakened up towards morning, the noise had ceased. I struck a match to see the time. "Watch must have stopped last night. Hullo, you chaps, what's the time?" A sound of another match through the thin partition, and a reply. "Nearly nine." "Nonsense! Why, page 140it's pitch dark, and it should be light at 7.30." "Mine says nine, too," came another voice. Then we guessed, and again guessed right. We were in the shadow of a huge dust cloud. As it became light, we even felt in the spouting for volcanic sand, but vainly, though we heard afterwards that a very slight sprinkling had fallen within two miles of us.

There were no telephones in those days, and it was not till late the next day that we heard from a casual visitor from the coast town of the blowing up of Mt. Tarawera, 120 miles away, of the villages swamped by hot mud, of the loss of life, and the destruction of the famous pink terraces.

It is held, I believe, that the immediate cause of the trouble was the breaking through of the waters of a lake into subterranean heat, causing the sudden generation of an enormous body of steam at immense pressure.

The hot spring district where this took place has its charms, but it would seem to some of us rather too chancy a place for a home. You never know there what's coming next. There was a big geyser, Waimunga, the show well of the world, which used to "throw up" at intervals, sending a huge mass of mud, stones, and water several hundreds of feet into the air. The Govern-page 141ment having built, though at a respectful distance, a little hotel for the comfort of the sightseers, the geyser promptly went out of business, and was practically idle for a dozen years or more. One stormy, wet night in 1917, however, without any sort of warning, it blew out sideways in a quite unexpected direction, completely destroying the hotel, killing the couple in charge, and covering a great piece of country with white mud. When I motored over to look next day, it was all quiet again, except the blowing off of steam from a couple of fizzing fumeroles.

When Rotorua, the capital of the district, was incorporated, the following clause was inserted in its charter:

"The Council shall not be responsible for any loss, damage, or injury sustained by, or through any eruption, or caused by any thermal action or arising from the natural flow of hot water, steam or natural gas, or from any sudden subsidence, or break in the streets, caused by, or through any natural upheaval or other volcanic action within the town."

Give me terra firma.