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For centuries, and even in these days, clandestinely; I am told by men whom I trust; the most beautiful maiden of a certain tribe among the Javanese; and some of the most beautiful women I saw in the Orient were those soft-skinned, soft-voiced, easy-moving, graceful-limbed, swaying-bodied; brown skinned women of Java; she, the fairest of the tribe is taken; and with her the strongest limbed youth; he of the fibered muscles; he of the iron biceps; he of the clean skin; and the two of them are tossed into the belching fiery crater of old Bromo.
At 11.30 came a Committee of Ladies soliciting Funds for the Home for the Friendless. "Those who are Friendless don't know their own Luck," said the Busy Man, whereupon the Ladies went outside and agreed that he was a Brute. At Noon he went out and lunched on Bromo Seltzer.
This latter place is easily reached in one day from Soerabaia; and close by is Mount Bromo, one of the most active volcanoes in Java, and one which is always covered with smoke. A three-mile walk will give the visitor an opportunity of seeing the boiling crater a magnificent spectacle.
Deep down at the bottom of the crater jets of greenish-yellow sulphur flicker in a cauldron of molten lava, from which a red flame now and then leaps upward, like an out-thrust serpent's tongue. No wonder that the ignorant mountaineers look on Bromo with fear and veneration, for it huddles there, in the midst of that awful solitude, like some monster in its death agony, gasping and groaning.
Then slowly, as if it were on a great mechanical stage, the perfect cone of old rumbling Bromo, from which curled a thin wisp of black smoke, bulged its way out of the center of that sea of white fog, rising gradually higher and higher as though the stage of the morning had been set, the play had begun, and unseen stage hands behind the curtain of fog, with some mighty derrick and tremendous power were lifting a huge volcano as a stage piece.
The door of each house is on the side nearest the Bromo crater, and as if tradition gave them cause to fear another destructive eruption they worship this volcano. Dirt prevails everywhere, and in consequence of the cool climate and the scarcity of water they seldom bathe, a fact that is very noticeable after one's acquaintance with the people of the plains.
The Bromo is the only one of the three now active. As we gaze down, we are startled by a deep groaning noise, and out of the wide crater mouth there issues a mass of grey smoke and ashes laden and streaked with fire. Simultaneously, a huge mass of cloud, cruciform in shape, is shot up hundreds of feet into the air from the Semeroe.
What's the sweat to get him married off to-day? Won't the girl wait?" "I never asked her. You pound up some ice and bring it in, will you?" The volunteer nurse kicked open the door into the little room and went in, hastily pouring the bromo seltzer from one glass to the other to keep it from foaming out of all bounds.
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