“Certainly. The difficulty is to attain the desired depth. To reach the temperature of boiling water it would be necessary to bore about three quarters of a league, which is impossible. However, a number of natural springs are known which, as they come from the ground, possess a high temperature, sometimes reaching the boiling point. They are called thermal springs, which means hot springs. There prevails, then, at the depth from which they come, a heat sufficient to make them tepid, or even boiling hot. The most remarkable hot springs of France are those of Chaudes-Aigues and Vic, in Cantal. They are almost boiling.” “Do these springs make streams that are different from others?” “Steaming streams, in which you can plunge an egg for a moment and take it out cooked.” “Then there are no little fish or crabs,” said Emile. “Certainly not, my dear. You understand that if there were any they would be cooked through and through.” “That is true.” “The little streams of boiling water in Auvergne are nothing in comparison with what are seen in Iceland, that large island situated at the extreme north of Europe and covered with snow the greater part of the year. It has numbers of springs throwing up hot water, called in that country geysers. The most powerful, or the Great Geyser, springs from a large basin situated on the top of a hill formed by the smooth white incrustations deposited by the foam of the water. The interior of this basin is funnel-shaped and terminates in tortuous conduits penetrating to unknown depths. “Each eruption of this volcano of boiling water is announced by a trembling of the earth and dull noises like distant detonations of some subterranean artillery. Every moment the detonations become stronger; the earth trembles, and, from the bottom of the crater, the water rushes up in an impetuous torrent and fills the basin, where, for a few moments, we have what looks like a boiler heated by some invisible furnace. In the midst of a whirlpool of steam the water rises in a boiling flood. Suddenly the geyser musters all its force: there is a loud explosion, and a column of water six meters in diameter spouts upward to the height of sixty meters, and falls again in steaming showers after having expanded in the shape of an immense sheaf crowned with white vapor. This formidable outburst lasts only a few moments. Soon the liquid sheaf sinks; the water in the basin retires, to be swallowed up in the depths of the crater, and is replaced by a column of steam, furious and roaring, which spouts upward with thunderous reverberations and, in its indomitable force, hurls aloft huge masses of rock that have fallen into the crater, or breaks them into tiny bits. The whole neighborhood is veiled in these dense eddies of steam. Finally calm is restored and the fury of the geyser abates, but only to burst forth again later and repeat the same program.” [Illustration: Giant Geyser, Yellowstone National Park]