ELISHA KENT KANE. 25 



capable at any time of listless idleness and in- 

 activity. He employed this interval to excellent 

 purpose. He was aware that the Philippine Islands, 

 and especially Luzon, the largest of them, contained 

 many peculiar features which were worthy of scien- 

 tific scrutiny and observation. He eagerly embraced 

 the opportunity now afforded him to examine them. 

 Prominent among the natural phenomena of this 

 quarter of the globe was the celebrated volcano of 

 Tael, in the island of Luzon. Its mysterious and 

 perilous depths had never yet been explored, or even 

 invaded, by the adventurous foot of man. To the 

 native Malays it was shrouded in mysterious awe 

 and terror, as the supposed abode of their great 

 god, the Deity of the Tael ; and they regarded any 

 attempt to penetrate its depths, or to descend into its 

 bosom, as fraught with sacrilegious crime, as well as 

 attended by inevitable death. Dr. Kane was totally 

 uninfluenced by any such considerations; nor did 

 he heed the graver objections resulting from the great 

 personal danger which attended the exploration 

 which he proposed. The summit of the crater of 

 Tael is two miles in circumference. Its perpendicular 

 height is four hundred yards above the level of the 

 sea. The interior of the crater descends seventy 

 yards in a perpendicular direction, after which the 

 declension becomes less abrupt. At the bottom of 



