284 ADAMS. 
tution. The literature available to me in Manila, where I was 
stationed, yielded little definite information, the most conspi- 
cuous statement being that Timor contains a volcano. Consult- 
ing Secrope’s work, which contains the earliest catalogue of 
volcanoes which is generally referred to, I found the following 
statement made in connection with the discussion of the de- 
struction of volcanic mountains by explosion: 
Such a catastrophe destroyed in the year 1638 a colossal cone, called the 
Peak, in the Isle of Timor, one of the Moluccas. The whole mountain, which 
was before this continually active and so high that its light was visible, it 
is said, three hundred miles off, was blown up and replaced by a concavity 
now containing a lake. 
In another passage the destruction of the cone of Timor is 
mentioned as a case supporting the “engulfment theory,” and in 
the catalogue the addition is made that the voleano once served 
like Stromboli as a lighthouse. 
Although I questioned the possibility of the light of a voleano 
being visible at a distance of 300 miles, and wondered who of 
the early mariners might have used it as a lighthouse before the 
eventful date of 1638, it did not occur to me that there would be 
any difficulty in finding the ruins of the “colossal cone.” Shortly 
after my arrival in Dilly, the capital of the eastern part of the 
island which belongs to Portugal, I began to inquire concerning 
the volcano, but no one knew of such a volcano as I asked about. 
One of the officials told me of a “mud volcano,” but I found no 
one who had seen it. Thinking that the ‘mud volcano” might be 
a solfatara near the formerly active center, I planned to visit it. 
On arriving at Viqueque, which is near the south coast of Timor 
and southeast of Dilly, the local Portuguese official in response 
to my inquiries obtained a guide and we set out to see the place 
which was well known to the natives. After riding for about 
an hour and a half down the river valley in which Viqueque is 
situated, we came to a place east of the river mouth and near 
the beach. There we saw what had once been a mud cone about 
100 meters in diameter and 15 meters high, judging from the 
crescent-shaped eastern portion which indicates its former di- 
mensions. The western part of the cone has broken down and 
spread in several nearly concentric mud flows. In the center of 
the crater there were two small cones less than a meter in 
height, which looked wet; the surface around them was deeply 
cracked mud. I ventured on it, although a stick thrust into the 
cracks reached soft mud at a shallow depth. A small amount of 
muddy water was rising from the centers of the cones, just about 
enough to balance the loss due to evaporation and to keep the sum- 
