228 THE AQUARIAN NATURALIST. 



no inconvenience ; and, with something like the feel- 

 ings of Dandie Dinmont when about to enter Hat- 

 teraick's cave, we followed. 



We have heard, gentle reader, of a man who went 

 into an oven in company with a leg of mutton, and 

 stayed there until it was cooked ; but to have imagined 

 ourselves voluntarily submitting to the fate of a 

 potato, was a stretch of fancy of which we were not 

 previously capable. However, we did it ; yes, on we 

 went, deeper and deeper, hotter and hotter. O ye 

 Tartarean shades, we expected to see some of you 

 then ! At length we reached the margin of a stream, 

 a boiling, hissing, bubbling, scalding stream. Co- 

 cytus? Phlegethon? I know not which it was; 

 how could we tell, by the light of a single farthing 

 candle, what might be around us in those regions of 

 black darkness ? We expected Cerberus to catch us 

 by the trowsers every moment ; however, we dipped 

 our baskets of eggs into the dreadful caldron, and 

 held them there till they were boiled. In doing so, I 

 put the tips of the fingers of one hand to the ground 

 to steady myself, and scalded them every one till they 

 were blistered it was hot work. I began to fear 

 I should faint, and my heart beat against my ribs 

 very unpleasantly. It was high time to be getting 

 back again, and I believe Dante himself was not more 

 pleased to see the stars appear, after his journey in 

 the realms below, than I was to inhale another gasp 

 of upper air. My first impulse was to rush into the 

 Mediterranean, which lay gently heaving close at 

 hand : 



" There shrinks no ebb in that tideless sea, 

 Which changeless rolls eternally : 



