Not only did a ravine open from this basin, winding its way up the entire ascent, but a copious stream of water ran through it, foaming and roaring amid its glens.  At first, Mark supposed this was sea-water, still finding its way from some lake on the Peak; but, on tasting it, he found it was perfectly sweet.  Provided with his gun, and carrying his pack, our young man entered this ravine, and following the course of the brook, he at once commenced an ascent.  The route was difficult only in the labour of moving upwards, and by no means as difficult in that as he had expected to find it.  It was, nevertheless, fortunate that this climbing was to be done in the shade, the sun seldom penetrating into those cool and somewhat damp crevices through which the brook found its way.

Notwithstanding his great activity, Mark Woolston was just an hour in ascending to the Peak.  In no place had he found the path difficult, though almost always upward; but he believed he had walked more than two miles before he came out on level ground.  When he had got up about three-fourths of the way, the appearances of things around him suddenly changed.  Although the rock itself looked no older than that below, it had, occasionally, a covering that clearly could never have emerged from the sea within the last few days.  From that point everything denoted an older existence in the air, from which our young man inferred that the summit of Vulcan’s Peak had been an island long prior to the late eruption.  Every foot he advanced confirmed this opinion, and the conclusion was that the ancient island had lain too low to be visible to one on the Reef.

An exclamation of delight escaped from our explorer, as he suddenly came out on the broken plain of the Peak.  It was not absolutely covered, but was richly garnished with wood; cocoa-nut, bread-fruits, and other tropical trees; and it was delightfully verdant with young grasses.  The latter were still wet with a recent shower that Mark had seen pass over the mountain, while standing for the island; and on examining them more closely, the traces of the former shower of volcanic ashes were yet to be seen.  The warmth in the sun, after so sharp a walk, caused the young man to plunge into the nearest grove, where he had no difficulty in helping himself to as many cocoa-nuts, fresh from the trees, as a thousand men could have consumed.  Every one has heard of the delicious beverage that the milk of the cocoa-nut, and of the delicious food that its pulp furnishes, when each is taken from the fruit before it hardens.  How these trees came there, Mark did not know.  The common theory is that birds convey the seeds from island to island; though some suppose that the earth contains the elements of all vegetation, and that this or that is quickened, as particular influences are brought to bear by means of climate and other agents.