r. All night, fleas and cockroaches
disputed with us for its possession, and we rose in the morning,
unrefreshed, to a day's ride in the rain. The road was worse than on the
day we first came over it. It had stormed incessantly, the streams were
swollen, the mud was deeper, and our horses stiff and weary, not to
mention ourselves as in the same predicament. At times it rained so hard
that our horses turned their backs to it, and refused to move, and there
we had to sit until the violence of the shower was over. We often waded
through streams up to the saddle-girth. Part of the way, the road was
made of the trunks of fern-trees laid crosswise, not more than two or
three feet broad. They were worn and broken, and in some places decayed
entirely away. We considered it, however, a good road, and cantered over
it, our sure-footed horses never once stumbling. Glad indeed, were we,
to see the white spire of the Hilo church, and more glad to reach Mr.
Coan's hospitable house, where hot baths and a good dinner in some
degree enlivened us. Grandma was tired, but a night and day's rest made
her quite herself again. We felt amply repaid for any amount of fatigue
or discomfort, by our view of the crater and burning lake. It was a
scene for a lifetime; no pen could describe it, no pencil portray it;
one must see it with one's own eyes, to appreciate its wonders. God
alone could create it; and his power only could say to this surging,
fiery torrent, "Thus far shalt thou come, and no farther."

March 24th, we took the steamer Kilauea. It rained as we sailed out of
the bay,--Byron's Bay as it is called. The surf rolls in here
terrifically, and beats upon the shore with an incessant booming sound.
The view of Hilo, as you enter the bay, is said to be very fine; but we
were so unfortunate as to come in, in the night, and to go out in a
rain-storm. The natives play in the surf a great deal. They have what is
called a surfboard perhaps four or five feet long. With this board, they
swim out perhaps a mile, and then lying on it, ride in on the top of the
surf-billows. I was sorry not to see this amusement; but the little
children, with their small boards, I often saw trying to imitate their
elders.

"Don't they ever get hurt, aunty?" asked little Alice.

Not often. The natives are perfectly at home in the water, and can swim
long distances. The women are about as good swimmers as the men.

Ah, the bell! the bell! we mustn't keep grandpa wa