124 THE ARCTURUS ADVENTURE 



keel. I have never seen such reckless voracity. 

 From appearances it would have been dangerous or 

 fatal for a man to have dived in at that moment. 

 Bill Merriam thrashed at the head of one with a 

 piece of canvas and it was torn out of his grasp 

 on the instant. I j^oked at them with the boat hook 

 and two seized it at once. Later a fisherman of our 

 party caught sixteen here, — a good two hundred 

 pounds, — on spoon or bare hooks, as fast as they 

 could be pulled in. 



Before I left the Arcturus, I had very carefully 

 examined, with my number twelve stereos, the 

 whole of Albemarle in sight, and mapped out a 

 tentative route to one of the largest outpourings of 

 gas. At the outset I was handicapped by not being 

 able to indicate or speak of the two great moun- 

 tains between which the eruption was in progress. 

 So I gave these nameless mountains the titles of 

 Mount Whiton and Mount Williams after the two 

 gentlemen without whose ship and generosity it is 

 probable that this volcanic outburst would never 

 have been recorded. The former is the most north- 

 ern on Albemarle and its height is unknown. 

 Mount Williams is next, thirteen miles to the south 

 and over four thousand feet high, which is appar- 

 ently somewhat less than the altitude of its neigh- 

 bor. Most of the activity was along the slope con- 

 necting the two mountains, the actual glow from 

 the lava being visible in groups or lines rather high 

 up near the ridge. But at hundreds of places all 

 over the slopes were fumaroles, or cinder caves 

 from which poured forth greyish white gases. A 



