Before them was the crater, a vast abyss, the bottom of which was hidden from sight by dense clouds of sulphurous smoke which forever ascended. Far away on the other side rose the opposite wall of abyss--black, rocky cliffs that rose precipitously upward. The side on which they stood sloped down at a steep angle for a few hundred feet, and then went abruptly downward. A mighty wind was blowing and carried all the smoke away to the opposite side of the crater, so that by getting down into the shelter of a rock they were quite comfortable.

The view of the country that lay beneath was superb. There lay Naples with its suburbs, extending for miles along the sh.o.r.e, with Portici, Castellamare, and the vale of Sorrento. There rose the hills of Baiae, the rock of Ischia, and the Isle of Capri. There lay countless vineyards, fields forever green, groves of orange and fig-trees, cl.u.s.ters of palms and cypresses. Mountains ascended all around, with many heights crowned with castles or villages. There lay the glorious Bay of Naples, the type of perfect beauty. Hundreds of white sails dotted the intense blue of its surface. Ships were there at anchor, and in full sail. Over all was a sky such as is seen only in Italy, with a depth of blue, which, when seen in paintings, seems to the inexperienced eye like an exaggeration.

The guides drew their attention from all this beauty to a solid fact.

This was the cooking of an egg by merely burying it in the hot sand for a few minutes.

b.u.t.tons now proposed to go down into the crater. The guides looked aghast.

"Why not?"

"Impossible, Signor. It's death."

"Death? Nonsense! come along and show us the way."

"The way? There is no way. No one ever dares to go down. Where can we go to? Do you not see that beyond that point where the rock projects it is all a precipice?"

"That point? Well, that is the very spot I wish to go to. Come along."

"Never, Signor."

"Then I'll go."

"Don't. For the sake of Heaven, and in the name of the most Holy Mother, of St. Peter in chains, of all the blessed Apostles and Martyrs, the glorious Saints and--"

"Blessed Botheration," cried b.u.t.tons, abruptly turning his back and preparing to descend.

"Are you in earnest, b.u.t.tons?" asked d.i.c.k. "Are you really going down?"

"Certainly."

"Oh, then I'll go too."

Upon this the others warned, rebuked, threatened, remonstrated, and begged. In vain. The Senator interposed the authority of years and wisdom. But to no purpose. With much anxiety he sat on the edge of the crater, looking for the result and expecting a tragedy.

The slope down which they ventured was covered with loose sand. At each step the treacherous soil slid beneath them. It was a mad and highly reprehensible undertaking. Nevertheless down they went--further and further. The kind heart of the Senator felt a pang at every step.

His voice sounded mournfully through the rolling smoke that burst through a million crevices, and at times hid the adventurers from view. But down they went. Sometimes they slid fearfully. Then they would wait and cautiously look around. Sometimes the vapors covered them with such dense folds that they had to cover their faces.

"If they ain't dashed to pieces they'll be suffocated--sure!" cried the Senator, starting up, and unable to control his feelings. "I can't stand this," he muttered, and he too stepped down.

The guides looked on in horror. "Your blood will be on your own heads!" they cried.

As the Senator descended the smoke entered his eyes, month, and nostrils, making him cough and sneeze fearfully. The sand slid; the heat under the surface pained his feet; every step made it worse.

However, he kept on bravely. At length he reached the spot where the others were standing.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Descent Of Vesuvius.]

At the foot of the declivity was an angular rock which jutted out for about twelve feet. It was about six feet wide. Its sides went down precipitously. The Senator walked painfully to where they were standing. It was a fearful scene. All around arose the sides of the crater, black and rocky, perpendicular on all sides, except the small slope down which they had just descended--a vast and gloomy circ.u.mference. But the most terrific sight lay beneath.

The sides of the crater went sheer down to a great depth enclosing a black abyss which in the first excitement of the scene the startled fancy might well imagine extending to the bowels of the earth from which there came rolling up vast clouds dense black sulphurous which at times completely encircled them shutting out every thing from view filling eyes nose mouth with fumes of brimstone forcing them to hold the tails of their coats or the skirts it's all the same over their faces so as not to be altogether suffocated while again after a while a fierce blast of wind driving downward would hurl the smoke away and dashing it against the other side of the crater gather it up in dense volumes of blackest smoke in thick clouds which rolled up the flinty cliffs and reaching the summit bounded fiercely out into the sky to pa.s.s on and be seen from afar as that dread pennant of Vesuvius which is the sign and symbol of its mastery over the earth around it and the inhabitants thereof ever changing and in all its changes watched with awe by fearful men who read in those changes their own fate now taking heart as they see it more tenuous in its consistency anon shuddering as they see it gathering in denser folds and finally awe-stricken and all overcome as they see the thick black cloud rise proudly up to heaven in a long straight column at whose upper termination the colossal pillar spreads itself out and shows to the startled gaze the dread symbol of the cypress tree the herald of earthquakes eruptions and--

--There--I flatter myself that in the way of description it would not be easy to beat the above. I just throw it off as my friend t.i.t-marsh, poor fellow, once said, to show what I could do if I tried. I have decided not to put punctuation marks there, but rather to let each reader supply them for himself. They are often in the way, particularly to the writer, when he has to stop in the full flow of a description and insert them--

But--

We left our friends down in the crater of Vesuvius. Of course they hurried out as soon as they could, and mounting the treacherous steep they soon regained the summit, where the guides had stood bawling piteously all the time.

Then came the descent. It was not over the lava blocks, but in another place, which was covered with loose sliding sand. Away they started.

b.u.t.tons ahead, went with immense strides down the slope. At every step the sliding sand carried him about ten feet further, so that each step was equal to about twenty feet. It was like flying. But it was attended by so many falls that the descent of b.u.t.tons and d.i.c.k was accomplished as much by sliding and rolling as by walking.

The Senator was more cautious. Having fallen once or twice, he tried to correct this tendency by walking backward. Whenever he found himself falling he would let himself go, and thus, on his hands and knees, would let himself slide for a considerable distance. This plan gave him immense satisfaction.

"It's quite like coasting," said he, after he had reached the bottom; "only it does come a little hard on the trowsers."

On their arrival at the Hermitage to their surprise they saw nothing of Mr. Figgs. The Doctor had been sleeping all the time, but the landlord said he had not been that way. As they knew that the neighborhood of Vesuvius was not always the safest in the world, they all went back at once to search after him.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Where's Figgs?]

Arriving at the foot of the cone they went everywhere shouting his name. There was no response. They skirted the base of the cone. They walked up to where he had been. They saw nothing. The guides who had thus far been with them now said they had to go. So they received their pay and departed.

"Of all the mean, useless, chicken-hearted dolts that ever I see,"

said the Senator, "they are the wust!"

But meanwhile there was no Figgs. They began to feel anxious. At last b.u.t.tons, who had been up to where Mr. Figgs was left, thought he saw traces of footsteps in the sand that was nearest. He followed these for some time, and at last shouted to the others. The others went to where he was. They saw an Italian with him--an ill-looking, low-browed rascal, with villain stamped on every feature.

"This fellow says he saw a man who answers the description of Figgs go over in that direction," said b.u.t.tons, pointing toward the part of the mountain which is furthest from the sea.

"There? What for?"

"I don't know."

"Is there any danger?"

"I think so--Figgs may have had to go--who knows?"

"Well," said the Senator, "we must go after him."

"What arms have you?" said the Doctor. "Don't show it before this rascal."

"I have a bowie-knife," said b.u.t.tons.

"So have I," said d.i.c.k.

"And I," said the Senator, "am sorry to say that I have nothing at all."