XVII.] 
DESCENT OF ASAMAYAMA. 
351 
wood. The volcano has also small side craters, from which 
gases escape. The same coarse fantasy, which still prevails in 
the form of the hell-dogma among several of the world’s most 
cultured peoples, has placed the home of those of the followers 
of Buddha who are doomed to eternal punishment in the 
glowing hearths in the interior of the mountain, to which these 
crater-openings lead; and that the heresies of the well-meaning 
Bishop Lindblom have not become generally prevalent in Japan 
is shown among other things by this, that many of these open¬ 
ings are said to be entrances to the “children’s hell.” Neither 
at the main crater nor at any of the side craters can any true 
lava streams be seen. Evidently the only things thrown out 
from them have been gases, volcanic ashes, and lapilli. On the 
other hand, extensive eruptions of lava have taken place at 
several points on the side of the mountain, though these places 
are now covered with volcanic ashes. 
After having eaten our breakfast in a cleft so close to the 
smoking crater that the empty bottles could be thrown directly 
into the bottomless deeps, we commenced our return journey. 
At first we took the same way as during the ascent, but after¬ 
wards held off to the right, down a much steeper and more 
difficult path than we had traversed before. The mountain side 
had here a slope of nearly forty-five degrees, and consisted of a 
quite loose volcanic sand, not bound together by any vegetable 
carpet. It would therefore have been scarcely possible to ascend 
to the summit of the mountain this way, but we went rapidly 
downwards, often at a dizzy speed, but without other incon¬ 
venience than that one now and then fell flat and rolled head¬ 
foremost down the steep slopes, and that our shoes were completely 
torn to tatters by the angular lava gravel. Above the mountain- 
top the sky was clear of clouds, but between it and the surface 
of the earth there spread out a thick layer of cloud which seen 
from above resembled a boundless storm-tossed sea, full of 
foaming breakers. The extensive view we would otherwise have 
