44 The Mountaineer 
ALL NIGHT ON AN ACTIVE VOLCANO 
CHARLES ALBERTSON 
Recent newspapers report a renewed activity of Asama 
Yama in central Japan. Friends confirm these statements and 
tell of the loss of human life. All this brings clearly to mind 
a trip brother and I made to this energetie voleano-mountain 
some years ago. It was in September, 1901, that we took 
steamer from my home in Kobe for Yokohama. From there 
we traveled probably a hundred miles by narrow gauge and 
rack railway to a little village called Karuizawa, on the water- 
shed of the unique Island Empire. Asama Yama is of voleanie 
origin, without glaciers, young, and therefore shapely and 
attractive. It is gray-brown, of broad base, conieal, and rises 
in graceful curves from a plateau to a height of 8280 feet. 
One splendid fresh morning we started from Karuizawa 
at 8:30. Brother got away first while I was lengthening the 
stirrup-straps. He had three men to his jinrickisha, one in the 
shafts and two pushing. They swung out of the tiny mountain 
hamlet at a lively pace and all knew we were bound for Asama. 
After six miles the road began to elimb gradually and at eight 
miles we stopped at a clear, cool spring to fill our water bottles, 
as we should find no water beyond that point. We rested here 
a little and then started on up the winding roadway over the 
rounded foothills. In the cuts we could count three layers of 
scoria or pumice each 15 to 24 inches thick with black earth 
between. Evidently they were from three of Asama’s erup- 
tions many centuries apart. At 11:30, ten miles out, we left 
the road and turned in on the path which led to the foot of 
Ko-Asama. This means “Baby” Asama, and a pretty little 
thine it is, too. It is an exact miniature of the voleano and 
rises a thousand feet above the base of Asama. Here we had 
“tiffin” under a small pine. The jinrickisha could go no fur- 
ther, but the pony did go on up to the saddle between the 
baby mountain and its mother. We were now at 12:30 p. m. 
at the base proper of the mountain and our real work had only 
