"As we ascended, the flow became hotter under our feet, as well as more porous and glistening. It was so hot that a shower of rain hissed as it fell upon it. The crust became increasingly insecure, and necessitated our walking in single file with the guide in front, to test the security of the footing. I fell through several times, and always into holes full of sulphurous steam so malignantly acid that my strong dogskin gloves were burned through as I raised myself on my hands. "We had followed the lava-flow for thirty miles up to the crater's brink, and now we had toiled over recent lava for three hours, and by all calculation were close to the pit; yet there was no smoke or sign of fire, and I felt sure that the volcano had died out for once for our special disappointment.... "Suddenly, just above, and in front of us, gory drops were tossed in the air, and springing forwards we stood on the brink of _Hale-mau-mau_, which was about thirty-five feet below us. I think we all screamed. I know we all wept; but we were speechless, for a new glory and terror had been added to the earth. It is the most unutterable of wonderful things. The words of common speech are quite useless. It is unimaginable, indescribable; a sight to remember for ever; a sight which at once took possession of every faculty of sense and soul, removing one altogether out of the range of ordinary life. Here was the real 'bottomless pit,' 'the fire which is not quenched,' 'the place of Hell,' 'the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone,' 'the everlasting burnings,' 'the fiery sea whose waves are never weary.'[26] There were groanings, rumblings, and detonations, rushings, hissings, splashings, and the crashing sound of breakers on the coast; but it was the surging of fiery waves upon a fiery shore. But what can I write? Such words as jets, fountains, waves, spray, convey some idea of order and regularity, but here there was none. The inner lake, while we stood there, formed a sort of crater within itself; the whole lava sea rose about three feet; a blowing cone about eight feet high was formed; it was never the same two minutes together. And what we saw had no existence a month ago, and probably will be changed in every essential feature a month hence.... The prominent object was fire in motion; but the surface of the double lake was continually skimming over for a second or two with a cooled crust of a lustrous grey-white, like frosted silver, broken by jagged cracks of a bright rose-colour. The movement was nearly always from the sides to the centre; but the movement of the centre itself appeared independent, and always took a southerly direction. Before each outburst of agitation there was much hissing and throbbing, internal roaring, as of imprisoned gases. Now it seemed furious, demoniacal, as if no power on