It took us an hour and more to cross the cup of the volcanic plain,
and another half-hour or so to climb the edge on the farther side. Once
there, however, the view was a very fine one. Before us was a long steep
slope of grassy plain, broken here and there by clumps of trees mostly
of the thorn tribe. At the bottom of this gentle slope, some nine or ten
miles away, we could make out a dim sea of marsh, over which the foul
vapours hung like smoke about a city. It was easy going for the bearers
down the slopes, and by midday we had reached the borders of the dismal
swamp. Here we halted to eat our midday meal, and then, following a
winding and devious path, plunged into the morass. Presently the path,
at any rate to our unaccustomed eyes, grew so faint as to be almost
indistinguishable from those made by the aquatic beasts and birds, and
it is to this day a mystery to me how our bearers found their way across
the marshes. Ahead of the cavalcade marched two men with long poles,
which they now and again plunged into the ground before them, the reason
of this being that the nature of the soil frequently changed from causes
with which I am not acquainted, so that places which might be safe
enough to cross one month would certainly swallow the wayfarer the next.
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