Page:Our New Zealand Cousins.djvu/70

 that apocalyptic vision, and can now realize how even earthly forces may be joining with spiritual intelligences, in the never-ending adoration and ascription; and with a new significance we think of the phrase, "They rest not day and night."

Leaving the empty circumference, with its background of steam and ferns, and spouting gouts of boiling water, we descend the terraces, seeing the heavens in every pool; and in a retired nook to the left, under an overhanging canopy of scrub, we come upon three silently overflowing hot wells, pouring their scalding libations over three crested structures of great beauty, to which fancy has given the names of Queen Victoria's Crown and the Prince of Wales's Crown. The third Kate appropriates, and calls it Kate's Crown.

Through a leafy arcade we now thread our way. The ground sounds hollow, and echoes to our tread. There is a scent of hothouse air, and pulling up the long velvety moss, a tiny steam-escape follows the roots, which are hot enough to be almost unpleasant to the touch. Nothing can more vividly suggest the thinness of the crust on which we gingerly tread. What a forcing-house!

Emerging into the open, we now stand on a narrow neck of land, with crumbling, burning rocks all around, on which it would be unsafe to venture. A deep, black valley, called the Valley of Death (most appropriate name), lies on the one hand, and on the other is an agitated pool, in which, some time ago, a poor woman was scalded to death.