After going some miles up the mountain, the trees and other vegetation became scarce, and presently the road passed over nothing but rugged, barren lava rocks. At the end of about a dozen miles we came to a village called Nicolosi. Here we left our mules, and proceeded on foot to visit the crater of Monti Rossi, from which the eruption issued that destroyed Catania in 1669. This crater is about one third of the way up the mountain, and at fifteen or twenty miles’ distance, looks like a dark red spot on the black mass of Ætna. We travelled several miles over a great desert of coarse black sand, without seeing a single tree or shrub, till we came to Monti Rossi, which I found to be a mountain with a double summit and very steep sides, consisting of coarse gravel and tufts of long rank grass, with here and there a stunted willow. It was laborious work climbing up this loose soil and holding on by the grass and twigs; now and then we lost our hold and rolled to the bottom, for it was impossible to stay our descent on this steep declivity when once we began to slip. At last we got to the summit, which consists of solid rock. The wind blew in furious gusts on this high elevation, and we were forced to tie our caps firmly upon our heads for fear of losing them. I was, however, amply repaid for my toil in the ascent, for the view was grand beyond description. Under my feet was the crater, a yawning gulf of craggy rock, blood-red from the action of fire. All this rock had been thrown up from the bowels of the mountain. There was no opening at the bottom of the crater, the orifice having been filled up many years ago by the crumbling in of the sides, so that it is considered perfectly safe to descend to the bottom. I went down and stood over the spot from whence had issued those streams of fire that made such frightful destruction a century and a half ago. It appeared firm to the tread, like any solid earth, but it was startling to think what it once had been and might be again: it was, in truth, a pit of destruction. A prospect of a different description was exhibited from the top of the crater: the high point of this steep elevation shows the great body of Mount Ætna on one side with grand effect. When I recollected that this hill was a mere wart on the huge face of Ætna, I had a most lively impression of the enormous magnitude of the whole mountain,--seeing the wondrous bulk swelling up over my head twenty miles distant. Below, on one hand, was an immense level plain of black sand, on which I could discover winding foot-paths and stone walls, like lines drawn upon paper. Here and there I spied a traveller moving along the plain, mounted on his donkey, but at such a distance that he looked like a grasshopper astride of a mouse. Farther off, other craters and cones were discernible, and more in number than I could count. Each of these was a mountain of itself, but nothing more than a spot on the giant bulk of Ætna, whose bold peak, bright with snow,