he mud-lake, falling back into
its native cup, resumed its placid aspect and awaited its next upheaval
with as much tranquillity as if it had never known disturbance in the
past, and were indifferent about the future.

That evening our travellers encamped in close proximity to the crater,
supped on fowls roasted in an open crevice whence issued steam and
sulphurous smells, and slept with the geyser's intermittent roar
sounding in their ears and re-echoing in their dreams.

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

TELLS OF VOLCANIC FIRES AND A STRANGE RETURN "HOME."

This tremendous introduction to volcanic fires was but the prelude to a
period of eruptive action which has not been paralleled in the world's
history.

For a short time after this, indeed, the genial nature of the weather
tended to banish from the minds of our travellers all thoughts of
violence either in terrestrial or human affairs, and as the professor
devoted himself chiefly to the comparatively mild occupation of catching
and transfixing butterflies and beetles during the march southward,
there seemed to be nothing in the wide universe above or below save
peace and tranquillity--except, perhaps, in the minds of beetles and
butterflies!

Throughout all this period, nevertheless, there were ominous growlings,
grumblings, and tremors--faint but frequent--which indicated a condition
of mother earth that could not have been called easy.

"Some of the volcanoes of Java must be at work, I think," said Nigel one
night, as the party sat in a small isolated wood-cutter's hut discussing
a supper of rice and fowls with his friends, which they were washing
down with home-grown coffee.

"It may be so," said Van der Kemp in a dubious tone; "but the sounds,
though faint, seem to me a good deal nearer. I can't help thinking that
the craters which have so recently opened up in Krakatoa are still
active, and that it may be necessary for me to shift my quarters, for my
cave is little more, I suspect, than the throat of an ancient volcano."

"Hah! say you so, mine frond? Zen I vould advise you to make no delay,"
said the professor, critically examining a well-picked drumstick. "You
see, it is not pleasant to be blown up eizer by the terrestrial
eruptions of zee vorld or zee celestial explosions of your vife.--A
leetle more rice, Moses if you please. Zanks."

"Now, mine fronds," he continued, after having disposed of a supper
which it might have taxed a volcano's throat t