98 



EXPEDITION TO JAPAN 



A few hundred yards westwardly from this fountain is a cave of a remarkable kind. It 

 opens in the face of a projecting perpendicular bluff, and can be entered only in a boat. It is 

 about 30 feet high, 10 or 12 in width, and the water at its entrance has a depth of about 20 feet. 

 We penetrated it in our boat until the darkness became so great that we could no longer dis- 

 tinguish objects; but we found, by feeling along, that the cave there branched off right and left, 

 with apparently still as great a depth of water below and the same height as at the entrance. 

 There must be a horrible rush and roar of water in its recesses when the seas are high ; but, on 

 this occasion, its calmness, and the smoothness of its watery pavement, through whose clear 

 depths we looked down on the white sand below, were a pleasing contrast to the cold wind and 

 drifting mist which met us as we emerged. 



The bluff itself, in which the cave opens, is remarkable for a columnar formation surmounting 

 its arch, high above. This had so much the appearance of basaltic columns similar to those of 

 the Giants' Causeway in Ireland, or to trap formations, that I thought, at first, they must be 

 such ; but the rock of the cave is all sienite, and so is, probably, that of the columnar arched 

 rock above. I subjoin a sketch of this singular formation, and of the entrance to the cave. 

 Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 



GEOEGE JONES, 



Chaplain U. 8. N. 



Commodore M. C. Perry, U. S. N., 



Commanding U. S. Naval forces, East India, China, and Japan seas. 



Mineral spring near Haicodadi. 



