for whitewash, it was still so hot close to the surface that the hand could hardly
bear to be held in cracks a few inches deep, and from which arose a strong
sulphureous vapour. I was informed that some years back a French gentleman
who visited these springs ventured too near the liquid mud, when the crust gave
way and he was engulfed in the horrible caldron.
This evidence of intense heat so near the surface over a large tract of country
was very impressive, and I could hardly divest myself of the notion that some
terrible catastrophe might at any moment devastate the country. Yet it is
probable that all these apertures are really safety-valves, and that the inequalities
of the resistance of various parts of the earth's crust will always prevent such an
accumulation of force as would be required to upheave and overwhelm any
extensive area. About seven miles west of this is a volcano which was in
eruption about thirty years before my visit, presenting a magnificent appearance
and covering the surrounding country with showers of ashes. The plains around
the lake formed by the intermingling and decomposition of volcanic products are
of amazing fertility, and with a little management in the rotation of crops might
be kept in continual cultivation. Rice is now grown on them for three or four
years in succession, when they are left fallow for the same period, after which
rice or maize can be again grown. Good rice produces thirty-fold, and coffee
trees continue bearing abundantly for ten or fifteen years, without any manure
and with scarcely any cultivation.
I was delayed a day by incessant rain, and then proceeded to Panghu, which I
reached just before the daily rain began at 11 A.M. After leaving the summit
level of the lake basin, the road is carried along the slope of a fine forest ravine.
The descent is a long one, so that I estimated the village to be not more than
1,500 feet above the sea, yet I found the morning temperature often 69°, the
same as at Tondano at least 600 or 700 feet higher. I was pleased with the
appearance of the place, which had a good deal of forest and wild country
around it; and found prepared for me a little house consisting only of a verandah
and a back room. This was only intended for visitors to rest in, or to pass a night,
but it suited me very well. I was so unfortunate, however, as to lose both my
hunters just at this time. One had been left at Tondano with fever and diarrhoea,
and the other was attacked at Langówan with inflammation of the chest, and as
his case looked rather bad I had him sent back to Menado. The people here were
all so busy with their rice-harvest, which was important for them to finish owing
to the early rains, that I could get no one to shoot for me.
During the three weeks that I stayed at Panghu it rained nearly every day,
either in the afternoon only, or all day long; but there were generally a few hours'