remainder
of the hill surface.

This was on the northern slope of that hill. As the track turned here due
east, and rounded, as it were, this curious mount, we found in reality on
the other side a large, crater-like basin with lips of confused masses of
earth both vermilion and of vivid burnt sienna colour, as well as most
peculiar mud-heaps in a spiral formation all round the crater, looking as
if worn into that shape by some boiling liquid substance. To the
south-east, on the very top of a hill of older formation, was perched at
a dangerous angle another great yellow boulder like the one we had seen
on the north side of the crater. For a diameter of several hundred yards
the earth was much disturbed.

One mile further south-east, in traversing a basin a mile broad, it was
impossible not to notice a curious range of hills with some strange
enormous baked boulders--(they had evidently been exposed to terrific
heat)--standing upright or at different angles to the east side of the
hills, stuck partly in the sand and salt with which the ground was here
covered.

Irregular and unsystematic heaps of rock, on which sand had accumulated
up to a certain height, were to be seen to the south, and huge boulders
of rich colour lay scattered here and there; whereas near the mountains
which enclosed the basin both to south and east there were thousands of
little hillocks of rock and sand in the most disconnected order.

As we went on, two perpendicular flat-topped barriers were before us to
the east--like gigantic walls--one somewhat higher than the other, and of
a picturesque dark burnt sienna colour in horizontal strata.

The whole country about here seemed to have been much deranged at
different periods. We passed hillocks in vertical strata of slate-like
brittle stone, in long quadrangular prisms, but evidently these strata
had solidified in a horizontal position and had been turned over by a
sudden commotion of the earth. This conclusion was strengthened by the
fact that the same formation in a horizontal position was noticeable all
along, the strata in one or two places showing strange distortions, with
actual bends, continuing in curves not unlike the letter S. In the dry
river bed there were large rocks cut into the shape of tables on a single
pillar stand, but these were, of course, made by the erosion of water,
and at a subsequent date.

Further on we found a tiny stream of salt water in the picturesque
gorge--as we