o
kilometres, the old crater, or what the old geologists called the
elevation-crater, has been much larger. The volcano is still active.
For it constantly throws out "smoke," consisting of watery vapour,
sulphurous acid, and probably also carbonic acid. Occasionally a
perceptible smell of sulphuretted hydrogen is observed. It is
possible without difficulty to crawl to the edge of the crater and
glance down into its interior. It is very deep. The walls are
perpendicular, and at the bottom of the abyss there are to be seen
several clefts from which vapours arise. In the same way "smoke"
forces its way at some places at the edge of the crater through
small imperceptible cracks in the mountain. Both on the border of
the crater, on its sides and its bottom there is to be seen a yellow
efflorescence, which at the places which I got at to examine it
consisted of sulphur. The edge of the crater is solid rock, a
little-weathered augiteandesite differing very much in its nature at
different places. The same or similar rocks also project at several
places at the old border of the crater, but the whole surface of the
volcanic cone besides consists of small loose pieces of lava,
without any trace of vegetation. Only at one place the brim of the
old crater is covered with an open pine wood. The volcano has also
small side craters, from which gases escape. The same coarse
fantasy, which still prevails in the form of the hell-dogma among
several of the world's most cultured peoples, has placed the home of
those of the followers of Buddha who are doomed to eternal
punishment in the glowing hearths in the interior of the mountain,
to which these crater-openings lead; and that the heresies of the
well-meaning Bishop Lindblom have not become generally prevalent in
Japan is shown among other things by this, that many of these
openings are said to be entrances to the "children's hell." Neither
at the main crater nor at any of the side craters can any true lava
streams be seen. Evidently the only things thrown out from them have
been gases, volcanic ashes, and lapilli. On the other hand,
extensive eruptions of lava have taken place at several points on
the side of the mountain, though these places are now covered with
volcanic ashes.

After having eaten our breakfast in a cleft so close to the smoking
crater that the empty bottles could be thrown directly into the
bottomless deeps, we commenced our return journey. At first we took
the same