t welled
up in the great throat that had been so violently widened, and,
overflowing the edges of the crater, rolled down its sides in fiery
rivers. All the other craters in the island became active at the same
moment and a number of new ones burst forth. Indeed it seemed to those
who watched them that if these had not opened up to give vent to the
suppressed forces the whole island must have been blown away. As it was,
the sudden generation of so much excessive heat set fire to what
remained of trees and everything combustible, so that the island
appeared to be one vast seething conflagration, and darkness was for a
time banished by a red glare that seemed to Nigel far more intense than
that of noonday.

It is indeed the partiality (if we may say so) of conflagration-light
which gives to it the character of impressive power with which we are
all so familiar--the intense lights being here cut sharply off by
equally intense shadows, and then grading into dull reds and duller
greys. The sun, on the other hand, bathes everything in its genial glow
so completely that all nature is permeated with it, and there are no
intense contrasts, no absolutely black and striking shadows, except in
caverns and holes, to form startling contrasts.

"These safety-valves," said the hermit, referring to the new craters,
"have, under God, been the means of saving us from destruction."

"It would seem so," said Nigel, who was too overwhelmed by the sight to
say much.

Even as he spoke the scene changed as if by magic, for from the cone of
Perboewatan there issued a spout of liquid fire, followed by a roar so
tremendous that the awe-struck men shrank within themselves, feeling as
though that time had really come when the earth is to melt with fervent
heat! The entire lake of glowing lava was shot into the air, and lost in
the clouds above, while mingled smoke and steam went bellowing after it,
and dust fell so thickly that it seemed as if sufficient to extinguish
the raging fires. Whether it did so or not is uncertain. It may have
been that the new pall of black vapour only obscured them. At all
events, after the outburst the darkness of night fell suddenly on all
around.

Just then the wind again changed, and the whole mass of vapour, smoke,
and ashes came sweeping like the very besom of destruction towards the
giddy ledge on which the observers stood. Nigel was so entranced that it
is probable he might have been caught in the horrible t