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and the valleys more moist, where the streams trickle down; and here and
there are little waterfalls, over which in the spray enormous fronds
spread their green lace-work and sparkle with the fine pearly dew which
is formed by the spray from the falling water. Here an icy spring of
crystal purity gushes from amongst the mossy stones, and oddly enough a
little farther on we come upon another spring, from which steam rises,
but the water itself is of wonderful clearness, so hot that you cannot
bear your hand in it, and the basin is composed of delicate pinky-white
as beautiful as the inside of some of the shells which lie in the
glorious marine garden at the bottom of the lagoon which spreads all
round the island. We push on and at last leave the trees behind, to
find the vegetation curiously dwarfed, masses and tufts of wiry grass,
and we have to tramp over sandy, cindery stuff which gives way under our
feet, and sets some of the big stones in motion. For we have come upon
a slope which grows steeper and steeper, and runs up and up, till, quite
breathless, we stop short among the great grey masses of pumice-stone
and glassy obsidian which cut our boots. We look about and see from
where we are over one side of the island, in whose centre we nearly
stand. The forest is glorious, the lagoon looks like turquoise, and the
coral reef which forms a breakwater round the place seems from our great
height to be one mass of creamy foam, while beyond it stretching far and
wide is the glorious sapphire sea. We are terribly hot with our climb,
but the air here is splendidly invigorating, and we turn to finish our
last hit of a few hundred feet over loose lava, pumice, and scoria. It
is hard work, but we give one another a hand, and at last we stand at
the edge of a tremendous depression like a vast cup in the top of the
mountain, whose other side, similar to that on which we stand, is a mile
away, while below its the cup is brimming with the verdure which runs up
from a lovely blue lake a thousand feet below. All is beautiful, so
beautiful, that it seems to take away our breath, for flowers are all
about, the gorgeous butterflies are on the wing, noisy paroquets are
climbing head up or head down, and there is nothing to show that we are
on the edge of the crater of some tremendous volcano, but we catch sight
of a thin thread of steam rising to form a cloud over a bare rock-strewn
patch on one side. That tells us the fierce g