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"These are old craters, I reckon," said Hazon; "not volcanic, but mud-springs. This plain, you notice, is considerably below the level of the forest country. Depend upon it, the thing was once a big swamp, with great boiling, bubbling mud-holes." No time was it, however, for speculations of a scientific nature; and accordingly the leaders proceeded to dispose their lines of defence.

The beautiful map of Roto Mahana on an enlarged scale by Hochstetter shows no fewer than ten large sinter terraces descending towards the margin of this lake, besides several mud-springs, fumaroles, and solfataras.

We then went to the mud-springs, which are about a mile off, and are still more curious. On a sloping tract of ground in a slight hollow is a small lake of liquid mud, with patches of blue, red, or white, and in many places boiling and bubbling most furiously. All around on the indurated clay are small wells and craters full of boiling mud.

I stepped out on it to investigate and suddenly in I went. Faugh! how it smells." "Yes, it isn't exactly perfumed," said Jack. "But how did such a place come there?" "It's one of those mud-springs of hot water that are found in several places throughout the West," said the scientist. "It must have been quiescent for some time and then the thin skin of alkaline earth formed over it.