From this elevated position we had a clear and well-defined view of the whole summit of the mountain, which appeared to be permeated in every direction by a vast thermal action. The steep, broken sides of the enormous crater wound before us in the form of an almost complete circle of nearly a mile in circumference; and it could be plainly seen that, towards its north-western and western sides, it was considerably lower than on the side upon which we stood. Within the great circle, at its northern side, there was a smaller or inner crater of an almost complete rounded form, the sides of which inclined gradually towards its centre in the form of a complete funnel. This minor crater was separated from the larger one only by a narrow ridge or lip. Looking down into the main crater, which appeared to be about 400 feet in depth, its sides, rugged and broken, as it were, by the force of volcanic fires, were built up principally of enormous masses of trachytic rock, lava ridges, and beds of conglomerate, formed mostly of rounded stones and boulders fused together into a compact mass by what must, at some period or another, have been a very powerful igneous action. In fact, it could be plainly seen that the whole volcano when at the height of its eruptive force must have been the seat of a powerful volcanic activity, until gradually its exhausted fires subsided into their present state. In some places the sides of the crater were perpendicular and fell with a sheer descent, while in others they were more disturbed and broken. At the bottom of the crater there were scattered about huge rocky ridges, from the large crevices and fissures of which enormous jets of steam burst forth with a roaring, screeching noise, which echoed from the depths below like the wailings of the condemned. Hot springs sent up streams of boiling water, which ran over the rocks and then lost themselves in the hot, quaking soil, which sent them high into the air again in the form of coiling jets of vapour. Miniature cones of dark, smoking mud rose up in every direction, while around all was a seething, fused mass of almost molten matter, which appeared to require just one or two degrees more of heat to transform it into a lake of liquid lava. In every direction were large deposits of pure yellow sulphur, some of which assumed a rock-like formation; at other places it formed a crust over the steaming earth, and where the thermal action was less intense, the glittering yellow crystals covered the ground like a thick frost. No fire was visible in the crater, nor was there any indication of a very recent volcanic eruption. The whole crater of the mountain was in the state of a very extensive _solfatara_, which was evidently more active at some periods than at others. The inner or second crater, which likewise sent forth a vast volume of steam from its boiling depths, was in much the same condition of activity as the larger one, only