For the country around is not dead or even sleeping, and within a circuit of ten miles from Roto-rua there is enough to be seen to interest an intelligent sight-seer for many days. Personally I do not think Roto-rua the finest spot in the thermal region. Taupo, with its lake, river, and great volcanoes, has, to my mind, higher claims. Much as Roto-rua has to show, I suspect that the Waiotapu valley offers a still better field to the man of science. However, the die has been cast, and Roto-rua, as the terminus of the railway and the seat of the Government sanatorium, has become a kind of thermal capital. There is no need to complain of this. Its attractions are many, and, when they are exhausted, you can go thence to any other point of the region. You may drive to Taupo by one coach-road and return by another, or may easily reach Waiotapu in a forenoon. Anglers start out from Roto-rua to fish in a lake and rivers where trout are more than usually abundant. You can believe if you like that the chief difficulty met with by Roto-rua fishermen is the labour of carrying home their enormous catches. But it is, I understand, true that the weight of trout caught by fly or minnow in a season exceeds forty tons. At any rate--to drop the style of auctioneers’ advertisements--the trout, chiefly of the rainbow kind, are very plentiful, and the sport very good. I would say no harder thing of the attractions of Roto-rua and its circuit than this,--those who have spent a week there must not imagine that they have seen the thermal region. They have not even “done” it, still less do they know it. Almost every part of it has much to interest, and Roto-rua is the beginning, not the end of it all. I know an energetic colonist who, when travelling through Italy, devoted one whole day to seeing Rome. Even he, however, agrees with me that a month is all too short a time for the New Zealand volcanic zone. Sociable or elderly tourists have a right to make themselves snug at Roto-rua or Wairakei. But there are other kinds of travellers; and holiday-makers and lovers of scenery, students of science, sportsmen, and workers seeking for the space and fresh air of the wilderness, will do well to go farther afield. At Roto-rua, as at other spots in the zone, you are in a realm of sulphur. It is in the air as well as the water, tickles your throat, and blackens the silver in your pocket. Amongst many compensating returns it brightens patches of the landscape with brilliant streaks of many hues--not yellow or golden only, but orange, green, blue, blood-red, and even purple. Often where the volcanic mud would be most dismal the sulphur colours and glorifies it. Alum is found frequently alongside it, whitening banks and pool in a way that makes Englishmen think of their chalk downs. One mountain, Maunga Kakaramea (Mount Striped-Earth), has slopes that suggest an immense Scottish plaid. [Illustration: WAIROA GEYSER]