I may as well confess at once that I was sadly disappointed. It was a pleasure, of course, to see what I had read of and pictured to my mind, from early boyhood; but this contemptible little affair looked very much like a humbug. A vague idea had taken possession of my mind that I would see a whole district of country shooting up hot water and sulphurous vapors—a kind of hell upon earth; but that thing ahead of us—that little curl of smoke on the horizon looked so peaceful, so inadequate a result of great subterranean fires, that I could not but feel some resentment toward the travelers who had preceded me, and whose glowing accounts of the Geysers had deceived me. At this point of view it was not at all equal to the Geysers of California. I had a distinct recollection of the great cañon between Russian River Valley and Clear Lake, the magnificent hills on the route, the first glimpse of the infernal scene far down in the bed of the cañon, the boiling, hissing waters, and clouds of vapor whirling up among the rocks, the towering crags on the opposite side, and the noble forests of oak and pine that spread “a boundless contiguity of shade” over the wearied traveler, and I must say a patriotic pride took possession of my soul. We had beaten the world in the production of gold; our fruits were finer and our vegetables larger than any ever produced in other countries; our men taller and stronger, our women prettier and more prolific, our lawsuits more extensive, our fights the best ever gotten up, our towns the most rapidly built and rapidly burned—in short, every thing was on a grand, wide, broad, tall, fast, overwhelming scale, that bid defiance to competition, and now I was satisfied we could even beat old Iceland in the matters of Geysers. I really felt a contempt for that little streak of smoke. Perhaps something in the expression of my eye may have betrayed my thoughts, for Zöega, as if he felt a natural pride in the wonders of Iceland and wished them to be properly appreciated, hastily added, “But you must not judge of the Geysers by what you now see, sir! That is only the little Geyser. He don’t blow up much. The others are behind the first rise of ground.”
“That may be, Zöega. I have no doubt they are very fine, but it is not within the bounds of possibility that they should equal the Geysers of California.”
“Indeed, sir! I didn’t know you had Geysers there.”
“Didn’t know it! Never heard of the Geysers of California?”
“Never, sir.”
“Well, Zöega, that is remarkable. Our Geysers are the finest, the bitterest, the smokiest, the noisiest, the most infernal in the world; and as for mountains, our Shasta Bute would knock your Mount Hecla into a cocked hat!”
“Is it possible!”
“Of course it is.”
“And have you great lava-beds covering whole valleys as we have here?”
“Certainly—only they are made of gold. We call them Placers—Gold Placers.”