64 CAMPS IN THE CARIBBEES. 



the air at the same time, sixty-seven degrees ; of the 

 streams falling into the lake, sixty-five degrees, Fahr- 

 enheit. Some months previously, Dr. Nicholls, one 

 of the original exploring party who discovered this 

 lake, found it at a temperature of one hundred and 

 ninety-six degrees ; and Mr. Prestoe, of the Botanic 

 Gardens of Trinidad, recorded from one hundred and 

 eighty to one hundred and ninety degrees. They 

 also found it fiercely boiling, the whole crater filled 

 with steam, and could obtain only occasionally a 

 glimpse of the water and surrounding walls. They 

 found no bottom with a line one hundred and ninety- 

 five feet long, ten feet from the water's edge. With 

 Mr. Prestoe, I conclude that this solfatara, by widen- 

 ing and deepening its outlet, will eventually lose its 

 lake character and become merely a geyser. 



From the high bank above the lake, near the gap 

 through which the waters find egress, is a fine view of 

 the whole northern wall, with the streams falling down 

 from the background of mountain, the hollows and 

 miniature valleys and peaks beyond. The river-bed 

 below is dry and yellow ; but huge rocks, tons in 

 weight, that the waters have moved from their beds, 

 attest the force of the current when the lake is at its 

 height. From the north, coming down into another 

 desolate valley, are small streams — yellow, white, 

 green, blue. A spring boils up through a hole three 

 feet across, overtopping the surface eight inches or 

 more. The main volume of hot water comes from 

 higher up the mountains, and there is, I think, another 

 source as large as this, which at present is unknown. 

 The mountains around are green with low shrubs, 

 and from the bank above the lake I secured a giant 



