e young man lay there in a state of the most
intense egotism, utterly prostrate, but supremely content.

Then all at once there was a change.

He felt a sensation of discomfort, and his hand began to stray about
him, and he found that his double-barrelled gun, slung by a strap across
his shoulders, was beneath his back, and the lock was pressing against
his ribs.

He changed his position so as to lay the gun beside him, and the
movement shot an acute pain through his head.

It did more; it sent a pang of mental agony through his brain; and he
scrambled up to his knees, to bend down, pressing his hands to the sides
of his head as if to keep it from splitting apart as he recalled all
now, and stared wildly about him in search of his companions.

The sensation of selfish enjoyment had all passed away, and he was in
full possession of his faculties.

He had found his way back, then, out of the mist, but where were they?

No; he was wrong; he had not found his way back as he fancied at first,
for where they entered the land around was burned up and bare; here
everything was glorious with tropic growth; there were lovely
butterflies, inches across the wing, and metallic in tint; brightly
plumaged birds, too, were darting past his eyes. He must have passed
right through the mist to the farther side and reached the place they
sought.

He involuntarily turned, and there, about a couple of miles away
apparently, and rising far up in the clear blue sky, with a huge
ball-like cloud suspended above the conical top, was the great volcano,
bare, stern, and repellent, without a scrap of verdure to relieve the
eye. It stood up tremendous in height, and in his rapid glance Oliver
Lane could see how all round had been blackened, or charred into a
greyish ash-colour, save in two places, where broad blackish bands
reached from a chasm near the top of the crater, right down the sides,
till they were hidden by the tall trees still standing, and apparently
spreading from the gentle eminence upon which he knelt for about a mile.

Where, then, were his friends, he asked himself, and recovering his feet
now, he had to seize the nearest bough and hold on, for a sudden
giddiness assailed him, and he nearly fell. But this passed off in a
few moments, and he stood looking round to see if they too had passed
through.

But as far as he could see, he was alone in an open jungly spot, teeming
with all that was bright and beautiful in natur