MINERAL SPRING AT HAKODADI. 447 



for tlie pedestrian as that in the neighborliood of Simoda. The environs are comiiaratively rude 

 and uncultivated, and the land is so broken by the hills and mountainous elevations, that the 

 roads are necessarily steep, irregular, and toilsome to the traveller. The isolated rock at the 

 base, and on the side of which the town is built, is steep and rough, but is ascended by a 

 •winding path to the top. The summit commands a fine view of the harbor, and was often 

 scaled by the oificers of the exi^edition, where they were reminded of the high advance in art of 

 the country by finding an observatory, or look-out for vessels, supplied with a telescope of 

 Japanese manufacture, being arranged with glasses like our own inserted in a tube of bamboo. 



The geological features of the hill itself are of considerable interest. It is composed of a 

 variety of granite, the syenite, generally gray, though occasionally of a reddish tint, in which 

 crystals of tourmaline are more or less abundantly diflused. On the southwestern side of the 

 promontory the rock has been first torn apart by some subterranean force, leaving a crevice 

 about twenty feet in width, and subsequently another upheaving movement has forced up, 

 s© as to fill the sjmce partially, a rocky substance, similar to the mountain in kind, but 

 with no tourmaline, and a softer feldspar, having the charaeter of the porphyritic formation. 

 At this point a mineral sjiring issues from the crevices of the rock. It is considerably impreg- 

 nated with sulphuretted hydrogen gas, as was very evident from its taste and odor, is warm to 

 the touch, and one of the surgeons reports it as " sitting lightly on the stomach." Its gases 

 and odor are lost, however, by being kept even for a shoi't time. The water contains chloride 

 of sodium, and probably some mineral sulphate or sulphuret. The intelligent medical officer 

 Dr. Green, to whose account we are indebted for our information, further reports it to bo 

 medicinally somewhat diuretic and slightly aperient, and infers that it would be probably 

 beneficial in some cutaneous diseases and chronic complaints, where the secretions are disordered 

 or suppressed. The natives, who accompanied the Americans to the spring, made signs that 

 the water was not good to drink, but excellent to bathe in ; and the erection of a presiding 

 deity in its neighborhood, and the frequent use of it by the inhabitants for washing themselves, 

 proved a high appreciation of its qualities. 



A few hundred yards west of the sulphur spring, at the back of the town, is a natural cave 

 in the mountain. It opens from the sea into a steep, perpendicular cliff, and can be entered 

 only by means of a boat. It is about thirty feet high, a dozen or so in width, and the water at 

 the entrance has a depth of nearly twenty feet. A party from the ships penetrated it until the 

 darkness of the interior became so great that objects could no longer be distinguished ; it was 

 found, however, by groping along, that the cave branched ofi" to the right and left, witli appa- 

 rently the same depth of water and tlie same height of roof as at the entrance. Within, a 

 perfect calmness reigned, the water being almost motionless, and the atmosphere close and 

 undisturbed by a breath of wind. Wlien the light was sufficient, the bottom could be seen 

 glistening brightly with a deposit of white sand. When storms prevail, there must be a great 

 rushing of waters, and war of the winds, through this cavernous channel. The entrance to 

 the cave is arched, and the rocky clifi" in which it opens has a columnar formation, extending 

 from the curve of the arch, high up the rock. At first sight it was sujiposed to be basalt, as it 

 had a similar appearance to the columns of the Giant's causeway in Ireland ; but on further 

 investigation, the geological formation proved to be the syenitic form of granite, like the main 

 body of the mountain. 



The peninsula on which the town stands afibrds but a few score of acres of arable land lying 



