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- 
stantly 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 “Soufriére-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, 
