"Ay, ay," cried Smith, taking off his hat and waving it about as he spoke. "Billy Wriggs is right, sir. It is grand to find you gents with all your bags o' tricks ready for everything: Mr Drew with his piles o'

blottin'-paper to suck all the joost outer the leaves and flowers, and Mr Lane here, with his stuff as keeps the skins looking as good as if they were alive, and, last o' hall, you with your hammer--ay, that's it!--and your myklescrope and bottle o' stuff as you puts on a bit o'

stone to make it fizzle and tell yer what kind it is. It's fine, sir, it's fine, and it makes us two think what a couple o' stoopid, common sailors we are, don't it, Billy?"

"Ay, Tommy, it do, but yer see we had to go as boys afore the mast, and never had no chances o' turning out scholards."

"But you turned out a couple of first cla.s.s sailors," said Oliver warmly, "and as good and faithful helpmates as travellers could wish to have at their backs. We couldn't have succeeded without you."

"So long, sir, as their legs don't want to run away with 'em, eh, messmate?" said Smith with a comical look at Wriggs.

"Ay, they was a bit weak and w.a.n.kle that day," said Wriggs, chuckling.

"Never mind about that, my lads," cried Panton, who had been busy breaking off a bit of the stone on which Oliver had sat--a very dark time-stained blackish-brown, almost covered with some form of growth, but the fresh fracture was soft glittering, and of a silvery grey, as pure and clear as when it was thrown out of the crater as so much vesicular cindery sc.u.m.

"Yes," said Drew, examining the fragment. "You are right. Well, I say thank you for bringing us up to see this glorious place."

"And I too, as heartily," said Oliver. "We must come up here regularly for the next month at least; why, there are specimens enough here to satisfy us all."

"Quite," said Drew, "and I propose we begin collecting to-day."

"And I second you," said Lane.

"And I form the opposition," cried Panton. "Do you suppose I made all that fuss to bring you only to see this old crater?"

"Isn't it enough?" said Oliver.

"No," cried Panton excitedly. "This is nothing to the wonders I have to show. Now, then, this way. Come on."

CHAPTER FORTY.

A GRIM JOURNEY.

Panton plunged at once down the slope as if to go diagonally to the water's edge, and his companions followed him in and out and over the blocks, which were a feast for Drew, while at every few steps some strange bird, insect, or quadruped offered itself as a tempting prize to Oliver, but no one paused. The gathering in of these prizes was left till some future time.

It was as the others supposed, Panton was descending to the water's edge, reaching it just where the crater rose up more steeply and chaotically rugged than in the other parts.

"Look out!" he cried, loudly, and, raising his piece, he fired at the great leopard-like creature which had evidently taken refuge here, and now bounded out with a fierce growl, and away along the rocks by the edge of the lake.

The bullet sent after it evidently grazed the animal, for it sprang into the air and fell with a tremendous splash into the water, but scrambled out again, and went bounding away, while, instead of following their comrade's example, Oliver and Drew stood listening, appalled by the deep roar as of subterranean thunder, which ran away from close to their feet to die away in the distance, and then rise again--a strange reverberation that seemed to make the rocks quiver upon which they stood.

"We must have him some day," said Panton, stepping right down on a stone, whose surface was just above the level of the water; and now, for the first time, Oliver saw that there was a slightly perceptible current running on either side of this stone, the water gliding by with a gla.s.sy motion, this evidently being the outlet of the lake; and on joining Panton he found himself facing what resembled a rugged Gothic archway at the foot of the stony walls, where a couple of great fragments of lava had fallen together.

"Why, it is a cavern!" cried Oliver, as he bent forward, and tried to peer into the darkness before him.

"A cavern? Yes; Aladdin's cave, and we're going to explore it," cried Panton. "Now then, Smith, five candles, please, and all lit ready for us to go in and see what there is to be seen."

Smith walked right in, stepping from stone to stone for a few yards, and then leaping off the block on which he stood in midstream to the lava at the side; and, upon Oliver following him, he found that he was standing upon another stream, one which had become solid as it cooled, while the water which now filled the cup-like hollow had gradually eaten itself a channel in the stone, about a quarter of the width of the lava, and this flowed on into the darkness right ahead.

"What do you think of it?" cried Panton.

"Wet, dark, and creepy," said Oliver, as he listened to a peculiar whispering noise made by the water as it glided along in its stone ca.n.a.l, the sound being repeated in a faint murmur from the sides and top.

Then _scritch-scratch_ and a flash of light which sank and then rose again, as the splint of wood, whose end Smith had struck, began to burn strongly.

"Now, Billy! Candleses!" cried the sailor, and light after light began to burn, showing the shape of the place--a fairly wide rift, whose sides came together about twenty feet overhead. The floor was wonderfully level and some forty feet wide, the stream being another nine or perhaps but eight, but widening as it went on.

As soon as the candles were lit Smith held up three, and Wriggs two, right overhead, so as to illuminate the place, and Oliver and Drew gazed with a feeling of awe at the sloping sides which glistened with magnificent crystals, many of which were pendent from sloping roof and sides, though for the most part they were embedded in the walls.

"Well, is that wet, dark, and creepy?" cried Panton.

"It is very wonderful," replied Drew. Oliver said nothing, for he was peering right before him into the darkness, and trying to master a curious feeling of awe.

"This is something like a find," cried Panton, triumphantly.

"How far does it go in?" said Oliver, at last.

"Don't know. We are going to explore."

"Will it be safe? This may lead right down into the bowels of the volcano."

"I think not," said Panton, "but right away underground somewhere. Once upon a time when the volcano was in action it overflowed here or cut a way through the wall, and then the fiery stream forced its way onward, and was, no doubt, afterwards covered in by the stones and cinders hurled out by the mountain. Then, of course, after the volcano had played itself out, and the lake formed in the crater, it in turn overflowed, and the water ate its way along, as you see, right in the river of lava, which it followed naturally downwards."

"And do you want us to follow the stream naturally downwards?" said Oliver.

"Of course. I've only been in about fifty yards, but it is certainly the most wonderful place I have ever seen. Look here."

He picked from a crevice a great bunch of soft dark brown filaments, somewhat resembling spun gla.s.s.

"What's that? Some kind of fibre?" cried Drew. "But how does it come here?"

"Is it fibre?" said Panton, smiling.

"No; too brittle. It is gla.s.s."

"Yes. Obsidian--a volcanic gla.s.s."

"But it looks like the result of gla.s.s-blowing," said Oliver.

"Right; so it is. Volcanic gla.s.s-blowing. This must have been driven out of some aperture in the burning mountain during an eruption, steam acting upon flint and lime when in a state of fusion."

"But where are you going to get your flint and lime from to make a gla.s.s like this?" said Oliver.

"Who can say? From the interior of the earth, or from deposits made by the sea."

"I don't see that," said Drew.

"Indeed! Why, haven't you silicious sand, the lime from the coral and sh.e.l.ls and soda from the seaweeds of thousands of years. Plenty from that supply alone, without calculating what may be beneath us. Now then, forward: I'll lead, and we had better all go carefully, in case of there being any chasms. As far as I've been the floor was all like this, smooth and just faintly marked by a grain formed by the flow."