A CAMP IN A CRATER. 189 



anything like trees, and densely covered with a fern 

 with flat, branching head, and giant lycopodiums. 

 One would fancy he could walk over this hill in any 

 direction, so dense and solid appears this leafy carpet, 

 but a step outside the trail almost anywhere would 

 plunge him waist-deep in ferns, and probably neck- 

 deep into a hole. The view of the grand, rugged, 

 dark-green mountains near at hand, and of the con- 

 stancy unfolding shore, green with sugar-cane, is 

 superb. Here St. Vincent seems but two or three 

 miles across, and one sees what a little island it is ; 

 but, upon reflection, how grand are the works of na- 

 ture contained herein ! 



Half a mile from the summit I heard the weird notes 

 of the "Soufriere-bird," that songster about which 

 hung the mystery I hoped to penetrate. Slowly climb- 

 ing the winding path, I at length reached a cave, 

 hollowed out of the bank, hung with ferns dripping 

 with moisture. My cave, however, was a mile far- 

 ther, and without halting I passed on ; a sudden turn 

 revealed the crater, deep and vast, on the very brink 

 of which I stood. As my mule refused to go farther, 

 and kicked and reared in a manner not desirable on 

 the brink of a crater half a mile deep, I was forced to 

 return to the cave and tie this mutinous mule ; then I 

 returned to the contemplation of the great work before 

 me. The vapors wafted on the trade-wind, vapors in 

 odor sulphureous, had, by their strength, warned me 

 of its proximity. 



It was a vast amphitheatre, a mile in diameter, as 

 nearly circular as it is possible to be, three miles in cir- 

 cumference ; the walls ran straight down from my feet 

 to a lake at the bottom. The lip, or top, is irregular, 



