The daily morning journal and courier., 1903-06-20

straight down, but below this there is long slope Of cinders, at an angle of about thirty degrees from the vertical, which may be descended by making tacks across its face. At the bottom of the rater is small central crater. from which issues a roaring jet of steam, from a vent hole about fifteen feet across. There are other steam vents,
 but this one is the largest. The steam
 is impregnated with sulphur dioXide, and very unpleasant In the southeast corner are a number of steam jets,
 which have deposited on the cinders around them an incrustation of borax,
 but not. I think. in quantities worth working. .--
 There are also deposits of sulphur, but these, too, while of large extent, are very thin, and mixed with much silica. | The northwest corner of the crater con- tains small lake, incrusted with sul- phur and tasting strongly of alum. There is very little lava to be seen, and only occasional blocks of granite. In gully in the floor of the crater may be seen the real rock, free from the depos- 1 its of cinders and scoria. There os place in one of these gullies where there is an intrusive heet or iron oxide, hematite, think, which is so hard that the surrounding rock has been washed away, leaving the edges of the sheet or
 iron oxide standing out from the wall. This, too, was in quantity too small to be worth working, but is certainly ev- ! idence of the probable existence of good iron ore in the district.
 1 The last eruption of any consequence was in the eighteenth century. but there is evidence of a comparatively re- cent eruption on small scale. Over l the whole of the interior of the crater and to some extent on the outside, is a deyosit several inches thick of brown volcanic dust, which has a rust about a l quarter of an inh thick, due to the ac- l tion of the rain. This is of very recent origin.
 | The lake is surrounded on two sides | by an elevated plateau, and this pla- | teau seems to be the undisturbed rock of which the country is formed, and the l lake and the small islands in it appear to have been formed by some early eruption. The, lake is slightly saline, tasting of sodium sulphate. It connects with the China Sea through the River Taal, about six miles long. The hotel was all outdoors; we slept on a bank of ashes with a stone for a pillow and tropical moon straight overhead. It was clear enough in this moonlight to see mountains twenty miles away. The ! native boatmen slept near us, and in the morning cooked their food over a 1 fire made between three stones; they had rice, which they cooked in an | American galvanized iron pail bearing on its side the words Central Stamp ing Company" It looked homelike.
 They also had fish. dried, which they did not cook at all. Were itsnot for the abundance of fish, the native would fare badly, indeed. As, rule, the na- tive cooks only his rice, chicken. eggs and fish, and eats raw all the vegeta- bles and fruits which grow in the is- lands. One of the staple articles of diet in this part of the country is bean the pod of which contains row of small black beans covered with thick white pith; they eat the pith raw and throw the bean away. Then they have veg etable that looks like waxen tomato, but ink instead of red in color, and which tastes like cucumber spice, and apple mixed.
 After leaving the volcano the mad ride recommended. We had passed over the road the first time in the mid dle of the night, but the return trip was made by day. All along the road the native population was strung out to see the caravan of Americanos, and they certainly saluted us. in the most friend 1y way. We were told that the la drones were more likely to rob the CO., cheros of their horses than to meddle with us. If these ladrones are willing to rob their own countrymen, it does not look as though they were actuated by motives of a political character. I really think there is nothing in it, at least in Luzon, but robbery pure and simple. ,
 We went to find the president, and were stopped i'll front of the court house by Filipino policeman, who, touching his revolver, bade us await the presi- dent there. We sat in a row on the steps and the whole town came out to look at us. Some one harangued them in Tagal, pointing out the ''malo hom- bres, Americanos.'' until finally the president, a dignified old Filipino. ar rived. He upheld us entirely, and said he would see that we had additional ve- hicles to carry us on our way. We paid into court the amount he said was just. and waited for the vehicles he had promised us. Judge of our surprise when we found he had sent us the very same vehices that we had just been turned out of. The cocheros wore broad grins, and evidently thought it a good joke. They were more than satis- fled with our rate of pay, 1t being about three times what they get usually from their fellow-countrymen. The presi- dent told us that these cocheros owned their own rigs, and the men who had interfered were simply 'grafters" who hoped to bleed us. This was about all the ladronism we saw.
 At one village. one of our party who rode a chainless. coaster brake bicycle. was stopped with request that he ex- plain to the president the working of the machine. Then the president was induced to take his first lesson on a bi- cycle. and after he had fallen off few