106 
_ii. 
LETTERS FROM HIGH LATITUDES 
felt convinced I was coming to some mystical spot—out 
of space, out of time—where I should suddenly light 
upon a green-scaled griffin, or golden-liaired princess, 
or other bonne fortune of the olden days. Certainly 
a more appropriate scene for such an encounter could 
not be conceived, than that which displayed itself, 
when we wheeled at last round the flank of the scorched 
ridge we had been approaching. A perfectly smooth 
grassy plain, about a league square, and shaped like 
a horseshoe, opened before us, encompassed by bare 
cinder-like hills, that rose round—red, black, and 
yellow—in a hundred uncouth peaks of ash and slag. 
Not a vestige of vegetation relieved the aridity of their 
vitrified sides, while the verdant carpet at their feet 
only made the fire-moulded circle seem more weird 
and impassable. Had I had a trumpet and a lance, 
I should have blown a blast of defiance on the one, and 
having shaken the other toward the four corners of the 
world, would have calmly waited to see what next might 
betide. Three arrows shot bravely forward would have 
probably resulted in the discovery of a trap-door with 
an iron ring; but having neither trumpet, lance, nor 
arrow, we simply alighted and lunched: yet even then 
