It is impossible to conceive of a grander spectacle than this monster. It rises seven thousand feet, almost directly from the sea, and an immense volume of smoke, like a plume, is continually pouring out of its summit, broken with such regularity by masses of flame that rise a thousand feet that it has been named _El Faro del Salvador_--“The Light-house of Salvador.” Around the base of the mountain are fertile plantations, while above them, covering about two-thirds of its surface, is an almost impenetrable forest, whose foliage is perpetual and of the darkest green. Then beyond the forest is a ring of reddish scoriæ, while above it the live ashes and lava that are cast from the crater so regularly are constantly changing from livid yellow, when they are heated, to a silver gray as they cool. Yzalco is in many respects the most remarkable volcano on earth; first, because its discharges have continued so long and [Illustration: YZALCO FROM A DISTANCE.] with such great regularity; again, because the tumult in the earth’s bowels is always to be heard, as the rumblings and explosions are constant, being audible for a hundred miles, and sounding like the noises which Rip van Winkle heard when he awakened from his sleep in the Catskills; and, finally, it is the only volcano that has originated on this continent since the discovery by Columbus. It arose suddenly from the plain in the spring of 1770, in the midst of what had been for nearly a hundred years the profitable estate of Señor Don Balthazar Erazo, who was absent from the country at the time, and was greatly amazed upon his return to discover that his magnificent coffee and indigo plantation had, without his knowledge or consent, been exchanged for a first-class volcano. In December, 1769, the peons on the hacienda were alarmed by terrific rumblings under the ground, constant tremblings of the earth, and frequent earthquakes, which did not extend over the country as usual, but seemed to be confined to that particular locality. They left the place in terror when the tremblings and noises continued, and returning a week or two after, found that all the buildings had been shaken down, trees uprooted, and large craters opened in the fields which had been level earth before. From these craters smoke and steam issued, and occasionally flames were seen to come out of the ground. Some brave _vaqueros_, or herdsmen, remained near by to watch developments, and on the 23d of February, 1770, they were entertained by a spectacle that no other men have been permitted to witness, for about ten o’clock on the morning of that day the grand upheaval took place, and it seemed to them, as they fled in terror, that the whole universe was being turned upside down.