Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1872-03-28


mighty host of them" Our stole de.
termined to beat the fie ;es at their OWL
game still clings to the sofa.
The Hermitage is filling with visitor,
and dance progresses in the adjoining
room. The Judge counting sleep on the
bricks, Sheldon alongside, our stole with
Wilson bidding defiance to the fieas. a
candle standing in its own grease on the
pine table. Heavy breathing, snore and
snort, and the weary party are lost to
the world and to the discomforts of the
Hermitage.
A short while after midnight | 90 to
the adjoining apartment and find the
guide lighting his torches, then return to
the plague ridden . Chamber, and call
and our faces. Not with rain water
neither well water, nor spring water
oh ! &c Gods 1otat aeaSte," might cry
Bacchus. Vine, yes, verify wine, for
here it is cheaper than water. Good
night to Punch and Judy and to the i'm
questionable Hermitage.
Joined by four new guides and the
two we brought from Portici, we are
full to the brim with glowing expecta-
ton, and eXhilarated by the wierdness
of all about us. There away up, as d
watch fire on the battlements of glory,
Is the main crater, quiet as dream to us
only because we are so far from it. Now
we are off for the lava fields. We cross
the beds of cold lava made by the erup-
ton of 1859. l know not how to de
scribe them as they lay q distarted scared
and shapeless mass. OF one thing rest
assured, to cross them is destruction to
sole leather We scramble and we
climb, ever careful TO mark the foot
step Of our forward guide. In the dis
lance lighting the sky with the redness
OF their frey glow, are the lava fields,
but here all is darkness save the light of
our torches and the twinkling stars which
keep guard in heaven and tell us ever
and anon tbs the same world of ours,
strangely unfamiliar as 1t IL.
We find no little difficulty to adjust all
equilibrium, rolling and angling, pitch
ing and curving our bodies, as now we
are climbing Crags and descending wales
OF the black and shapeless mass, Al
ready we feel the warmth through cur
shoe a4lea, ana d quarter hour tedious
and dangerous eAertion brings us tc an
lndescrlbable wide spreading and terror
stricken scene. Why torches ? Why
moon? Why sun? We are among the
creyices, the riyulets, the streams, the
rivers and the lakes of molten lava.
Seething, surglng, rafting, cracking.
Pushing, not rushing. StrOlling, not
rolling A glutinous bed of inconcciv-
able heat makes way for the fresh mex
haustible tide that flows from a pent up
world Of the hellish stuff If, perchance,
you may dismantle fear and dispel the
terror of so wild and strange q spectacle,
how God speaks to your every sensibil-
ity. Fear you need not, consider YOU
must, interfere you cannot. atom You
are Might, majesty, EOl0er. Has NOR
tai mind ever doubted those attributes?
Then surely Vesuvius has never borne
such incredulity upon her heated treach-
erOus bosom. What means il all ? That
IS the question which comes upon every
zephyr of thought. Unanswered you
stare amidst the lividness of a world of
fire. DemOniacal Kisses and surges bid
ding defiance to all philosophy. dethron-
ing all reason and tingling ones every
emotion. Still you stare wOnder-stricken
while comes fresh issues from earth's
boiling cauldrOn. Enormousness plays
game OF fantasy, gracefulness, power,
but never of gentleness among these
molten changeful masses. Here is Sa-
tan's spring boiling supply to a graceful
rlyulet. There lake of liquid lava to
which ii issues with push and a crackle.
much as salt thrown upon fire, and OBJ
serve the outlet of that lake over crag.
petite Niagara, drip, drop, spit, spatter,
reluctance III every move, but move it
must. Here we tarry to gather speci-
mems. Our face burns with intensity of
the heated air, our shoe sOles scOrch.
rest we cannot, but to relieve our heated
feet stand first upon one foot and then
the other. All is sympathy with the
restlessness of the resistless volcano To
our surprise here is a woman (what VIC
lence to aestheticism) among a bevv of
specimen peddlers. The gentleness and
sensitiveness with which true wOmanlv
character is ever adorned, loses much of
its halo in this Italian madonna, for such
she seemed in the light of Gods watch
fire. We are astOnished that she should
tarry here to vend oranges. bananas
and the What-nOt of fruit stand. Gal
llleO, Cleopatra and Caesar, emblems of
the philosOphic. sensualistic, powerful,
are emblazoned on small pieces of lava.
hot from the vendors mould and sold
at price varying from three francs 81
cents to five CentimeS, Zone cent accord
ing to the disposition and capacity Of
the visitor
On We 20 from crag to crag Now
down valleys, now up hills of the tagged
jargon Of NesuyIus half way from the
base to its crater. The hours are fast
speeding and a grey light, token of ap
preaching morn, urges us to renewed
endcaNOr that sunrise may find Us up
that towering peak, the main source Of
these lava fields which seem fiery NOR
ass. We have not the slightest tinge of
despair, despite the ragged and almost
perpendicular route We must travel
nearly an half mile heayenward. How
unlike the timidity with which we meet
giant difficulties of life Climbing.
falling. rising. up up il .
has become matter of individual prov
css and weary, painting and out of breath
we faint not. Sheldon makes a luckless
yet lucky step and sprains his ankle.
Ibis statement may seem a paradox. the
sequel to my story will prove that
sprained ankle TO have been rare bless
ing i'll disguise. Lighter, brighter grows
the deep vault Of the eastern heavens.
and now just before day Shaler and the
Judge are near the summit, while Shell
don being carried by the guides is far
behind us. Rumble, rattle, bang, Jam
goes rock after rock with many
throe its womb disgorges the monsters
that kennel there. Imagine d red hot
stone, may be six feet square, thrown
from forty feet of blue flame which has
A licking tongue plays from the craters
mouth, and roaring numerically, rum
bling portentiously the Indignation of
imprisoned havoc, let loose but now and
hen, as such a stone shoots forth to fall
4 thousand feet, broken to atoms among
is kindred. Now we have a cloud of
steam, doubtless some subteranean lake
at one gulp of the ravaging
Interior mass Arnold had not our good
.ortune to climb the volcano during ac-
i've eruption yet his experience of pent
Up agony and rumbling of the elements
vas akin to our own. He says "A few