is not actually the case? “I know all about the idea that these eruptions of boiling water, steam, and sulphurous gases are produced by chemical action,” said our guide. “I’ve heard lots of scientific men talk about the subject, but I don’t believe nothing of the sort.” “And why not?” we asked. “Do you believe,” he said, “that chemical action in the earth could create power enough, first to bring water to 212° of heat, and then force it two hundred feet into the air a number of times every day in a column four or five feet in diameter, and keep it up for quarter of an hour at a time?” “Well, it does seem somewhat problematical,” we were forced to answer. “After living here summer and winter for six years,” he said, “I have seen enough to satisfy me that there is a great sulphurous fire far down in the earth below us, which, if the steam and power it accumulates did not find vent through the hundreds of surface outlets distributed all over the Park, would seek one by a grand volcanic outburst.” “Put your hand on the ground just here,” he continued, as we walked over a certain spot where our footfall caused a reverberation and trembling of the soil. “It is almost too hot for the flesh to bear,” we said, quickly withdrawing our hand. “Too hot! I should say so. Now I don’t believe anything but a burning fire can produce such heat as that,” he added, with an expression of the face which seemed to imply, “I don’t believe you do either.” “The original volcanic condition of this whole region seems also to argue in favor of your deductions,” we replied. “That’s just what I tell ’em,” continued the guide. “Them big fires that first did the business for this neighborhood are still smouldering down below. You may bet your life on that.” This rather startling idea is emphasized by a smoking vent close at hand, which is also constantly sending forth superheated steam and sulphurous gases, like the extinct volcano of Solfatara, near Naples. Sulphur crystals strew the ground, and are heaped up in small yellow mounds. Not far away an intermittent geyser bursts forth every sixty seconds from a deep hole in the rock-bed of the basin, showing a stream of water six inches in diameter, and sending the same skyward thirty or forty feet. Here also is a powerful geyser called the Monarch, which leaps into action with great regularity once in twenty-four hours, throwing a triple stream to the height of a hundred and thirty feet, and continuing to do so for the space of fifteen or twenty minutes. Beneath the sun’s rays all the colors of the prism are reflected in this vertical column of water, and not infrequently the distinct arch of a rainbow is suspended like a halo about its crown. Nature, even in her most fantastic caprice, is always beautiful. There are several other high-reaching and powerful geysers in this vicinity, but we will not weary the reader by pausing to describe them.