Before them was the crater, a vast abyss, the bottom of which was hidden from sight by dense clouds of sulphurous smoke which forever ascended. Far away on the other side rose the opposite wall of abyss--black, rocky cliffs that rose precipitously upward. The side on which they stood sloped down at a steep angle for a few hundred feet, and then went abruptly downward. A mighty wind was blowing and carried all the smoke away to the opposite side of the crater, so that by getting down into the shelter of a rock they were quite comfortable.
The view of the country that lay beneath was superb. There lay Naples with its suburbs, extending for miles along the shore, with Portici, Castellamare, and the vale of Sorrento. There rose the hills of Baiae, the rock of Ischia, and the Isle of Capri. There lay countless vineyards, fields forever green, groves of orange and fig-trees, clusters of palms and cypresses. Mountains ascended all around, with many heights crowned with castles or villages. There lay the glorious Bay of Naples, the type of perfect beauty. Hundreds of white sails dotted the intense blue of its surface. Ships were there at anchor, and in full sail. Over all was a sky such as is seen only in Italy, with a depth of blue, which, when seen in paintings, seems to the inexperienced eye like an exaggeration.
The guides drew their attention from all this beauty to a solid fact. This was the cooking of an egg by merely burying it in the hot sand for a few minutes.
Buttons now proposed to go down into the crater. The guides looked aghast.
"Why not?"
"Impossible, Signor. It's death."
"Death? Nonsense! come along and show us the way."
"The way? There is no way. No one ever dares to go down. Where can we go to? Do you not see that beyond that point where the rock projects it is all a precipice?"
"That point? Well, that is the very spot I wish to go to. Come along."
"Never, Signor."