[Illustration: THE LAKE OF FIRE.]
"Why, it isn't on the top of a mountain at all! What a humbug my
geography must have been!"
So wrote a little fellow to a young friend in America.
He was right. It isn't on the top of a mountain, though the
geographies do say, "A volcano is a mountain sending forth fire, smoke
and lava," and give the picture of a mountain smoking at the top.
This volcano is nothing of the kind; but is a hideous, yawning black
pit at the bottom of a mountain, and big enough to stow away a large
city.
Of course you want to know, first, where this wonder is. Get out the
map of the Western Hemisphere, put your finger on any of the lines
running north and south, through North America, and called meridians;
follow it south until you come to the Tropic of Cancer, running east
and west; then "left-about-face!" and, following the tropic, sail out
into the calm Pacific. After a voyage of about two thousand miles,
you'll run ashore on one of a group of islands marked Sandwich. We
will call them Hawaiian, for that is their true name. Not one of the
brown, native inhabitants would call them "Sandwich." An English
sailor gave them that name, out of compliment to a certain Lord
Sandwich.
On the largest of these islands, Hawaii--pronounced "Ha-y-e"--is the
volcano, Kilauea, the largest volcano in the world.
We have seen it a great many times, and that you may see it as clearly
as possible, you shall have a letter from the very spot. The letter
reads:
"Here we are, a large party of us, looking into Kilauea, which is
nine miles in circumference, and a thousand feet below us--a pit
about seven times as deep as Niagara Falls are high. We came
to-day, on horseback, from Hilo, a ride of thirty miles. Hilo is a
beautiful sea-shore village, the largest on the island of Hawaii,
and from it all visitors to Kilauea make their start.
"The road over which we came is nothing but a bridle-path, and a
very rough one at that, traversing miles and miles of old lava
flows. We had almost ridden to the crater's brink before we
discovered, in the dim twilight, the awful abyss.
"Before us is the immense pit which, in the day-time, shows only a
floor of black lava, looking as smooth as satin; and, miles away,
rising out of this floor, are a few slender columns of smoke.
"At night, everything is changed; and you can't conceive of the
lurid, demoniacal effect. Each slender column of smoke becomes
a pillar of fire that rolls upward, throbbing as it moves, and
spreads itself out above the crater like an immense canopy, all
ablaze.
"Ships a hundred miles from land see the glow, and we here, on the
precipice above, can read ordinary print by its lurid light.
"No wonder the natives worshiped the volcano. They thought it the
home of a goddess, whom they named Pélé, and in times of unusual
activity believed her to be very angry with them. Then they came
in long processions, from the seashore villages, bringing pigs,
dogs, fowls, and sometimes human beings, for sacrifice. These they
threw into the crater, to appease her wrath.
"A small berry, called the ohélo, grows on the banks of the pit,
and of these the natives never dared to eat until Pélé had first
had her share. Very polite, were they not? And if ever they
forgot their manners, I dare say she gave them a shaking up by an
earthquake, as a reminder.
"Sandal-wood and strawberries grow all about here--and fleas, too!
wicked fleas, that bite voraciously, to keep themselves warm, I
think, for here, so far from Pélé's hearth, it is cold, and we sit
by a log fire of our own.
"The day after our arrival we went into the crater, starting
immediately after an early breakfast. There is but one entrance,
a narrow ledge, formed by the gradual crumbling and falling in of
the precipice. Along this ledge we slipped and scrambled, making
the descent on foot--for no ridden animal has ever been able to
descend the trail. Holding on to bushes and snags when the path
was dangerously steep, we finally landed below on the black satin
floor of lava.
"Satin! What had looked so smooth and tempting from a thousand
feet above, turned out to be a surface more troubled and uneven
than the ocean in the most violent storm. And that tiny thread
of smoke, toward which our faces were set, lay three miles
distant--three miles that were worse than nine on an ordinary
road.
"How we worked that passage! up hill and down hill, over hard
pointed lava that cut through our shoes like knife blades; over
light, crumbled lava into which we sank up to our knees; over
hills of lava that were, themselves, covered with smaller hills;
into ravines and over steam-cracks, some of which we could jump
with the aid of our long poles, and some of which we had to find
our way around; steam-cracks whose depths we could not see, and
into which we thrust our walking-sticks, drawing them out charred
black or aflame; over lava so hot that we ran as rapidly and
lightly as possible, to prevent our shoes being scorched.
Three hours of this kind of work for the three miles, and
_Hale-mau-mau_, or 'House of Everlasting Fire,' lay spitting and
moaning at our feet!
"A lake of boiling lava is what the column of smoke marked out to
us,--a pit within a pit,--a lake of raging lava fifty feet below
us, of which you have here the picture taken 'from life.'
"It was so hot and suffocating on the brink of this lake that we
cut eye-holes in our pocket-handkerchiefs and wore them as masks.
Even then we had to run back every few moments for a breath of
fresher air, though we were on the windward side of the lake. The
gases on the leeward side would suffocate one instantly. Oh, the
glory! This Hale-mau-mau, whose fire never goes out, is a huge
lake of liquid lava, heaving with groans and thunderings that
cannot be described. Around its edge, as you see in the picture,
the red lava was spouting furiously. Now and then the center of
the lake cooled over, forming a thin crust of black lava, which,
suddenly cracking in a hundred directions, let the blood-red fluid
ooze up through the seams, looking like fiery snakes.
"Look at the picture, and imagine these enormous slabs of cooled
lava slowly rising themselves on end, as if alive, and with
a stately motion plunging beneath the sea of fire, with an
indescribable roar.
"For three hours we gazed, spell-bound, though it seemed but a few
moments: we were chained to the spot, as is every one else who
visits Kilauea.
"The wind, as the jets rose in air, spun the molten drops of lava
into fine threads, which the natives call Pélé's hair, and very
like hair it is.
"All this time, under our feet were rumblings and explosions that
made us start and run now and then, for fear of being blown up;
coming back again after each fright, unwilling to leave the spot.
"Occasionally, the embankment of the lake cracked off and fell
in, being immediately devoured by the hungry flood. These ledges
around Hale-mau-mau are very dangerous to stand upon. A whole
family came near losing their lives on one. A loud report beneath
their feet and a sudden trembling of the crust made them run for
life; and hardly had they jumped the fissure that separated
the ledge on which they were standing from more solid
footing--separated life from death--than crash went the ledge into
the boiling lake!
"Sometimes the lake boils over, like a pot of molasses, and then
you can dip up the liquid lava with a long pole. You get quite
a lump of it, and by quickly rolling it on the ground mold a
cylinder the size of the end of the pole, and about six inches
long. Or you can drop a coin into the lava to be imprisoned as it
cools.
"A foreigner once imbedded a silver dollar in the hot lava, and
gave the specimen to a native; but he immediately threw it on the
ground, breaking the lava, of course, and liberating the dollar,
which he pocketed, exclaiming: 'Volcano plenty enough, but me not
get dollar every day.'
"One of our party collected lava specimens from around
Hale-mau-mau, and tied them up in her pocket-handkerchief. Imagine
her astonishment on finding, later, they had burned through the
linen, and one by one dropped out.
"Terrible as old Pélé is, she makes herself useful, and is an
excellent cook. She keeps a great many ovens heated for the use of
her guests, and no two at the same temperature, so that you may
select one of any heat you wish. In these ovens (steam-cracks) she
boils tea, coffee and eggs; or cooks omelets and meats. You wrap
the beef or chicken, or whatever meat you may wish to cook, in
leaves, and lay it in the steam-crack. Soon it is thoroughly
cooked, and deliciously, too.
"She also keeps a tub of warm water always ready for bathers.
"She doesn't mean to be laughed at, though, for doing this kind of
work, and doing it in an original kind of way. After she has given
you one or two sound shakings, which she generally does, you'll
have great respect for the old lady, and feel quite like taking
off your hat to her. With the shakings and the thunderings
under-foot, and now and then the opening of a long steam-crack,
she keeps her visitors quite in awe of her powers, though she is
probably several hundred years old.
"Not far from the little hut where we sleep, close to the
precipice, is Pélé's great laboratory, where she makes sulphur. We
wear our straw hats to the sulphur banks, and she bleaches them
for us.
"Well, this is a strange, strange land, old Pélé being only one of
its many curiosities.
"I only hope you may all see the active old goddess before she
dies. She hasn't finished her work yet. Once in a while she runs
down to the shore, to bathe and look at the Pacific Ocean, and
when there she generally gives a new cape to Hawaii by running out
into the sea."
Majestic old Pélé! Long may she live!