110 NIMROD OP TBE SEA; OR, 



and fire materials, and then set out from camp, striking 

 from the path directly for a notch we observed in the range 

 before us. We had no means of carrying a supply of water, 

 and we trusted to our luck. After walking sevei'al miles, 

 we reached a district where, in all likelihood, human foot 

 had never 'trod. The face of the country was gloomy in the 

 extreme, broken into abrupt walls of flinty lava, the valleys 

 being floored with scoria. There was no vegetation or evi- 

 dences of life other than the little lizards. Following a 

 n.arrow defile which the rolling pumice made tiresome walk- 

 ing, we next met many walls, or dikes, of vesicular lava 

 thrown across the gorge. "We had to climb these under the 

 intense heat of the sun, and attained a summit overlooking 

 a plain several miles in extent. Our altitude was consider- 

 able, and we could discern a number of the surrounding 

 islands, and the ship lying quietly in her nook. Inland 

 stretched a plain of greater beauty than wfi had expected to 

 find, or had hitherto met. The grass was green, and the 

 trees and bushes comparatively luxuriant. 



Finding an easy descent, we hastened onward to seek the 

 refreshing shade of the trees, and with a faint hope that we 

 might obtain water. Great numbers of terrapin were about, 

 some of them of immense size — very much larger than any 

 seen on the shore plains. Here we first heard the deep bel- 

 lowing of the male terrapin — not unlike that of an angry 

 bull. But wherefore this cry was a mystery to us, as the 

 creatures seemed deaf to any sounds which we could make 

 to alarm them. Possibly the male felt that it was good to 

 bellow, though none might enjoy the music, or he may have 

 bellowed, as some flowei's grow and some men work, unseen, 

 for the love of God ; and, I might add, as an old sculptor 

 chipped marble in dark places. This reminds me of a story, 

 which I told to my companion as we trotted on. In a ca- 

 thedral of Italy, so old that the finger of Time was tracing 



