True, it
had been invaded by the people of Kaloon in several wars, but on each
occasion their army was destroyed or met with terrible disaster. Little
wonder then they had come to believe that the House of Fire was under
the protection of some unconquerable Spirit.
Leaving the marsh, we reached a bare, rising plain, which led to the
first slope of the Mountain three or four miles away. Here we expected
every moment to be attacked by the savages of whom we had heard so much,
but no living creature did we see. The place was a desert streaked with
veins of rock that once had been molten lava. _I_ do not remember much
else about it; indeed, the pain in my arm was so sharp that I had no
eyes for physical features. At length the rise ended in a bare, broad
donga, quite destitute of vegetation, of which the bottom was buried in
lava and a debris of rocks washed down by the rain or melting snows from
slopes above. This donga was bordered on the farther side by a cliff,
perhaps fifty feet in height, in which we could see no opening.
Still we descended the place, that was dark and rugged; pervaded,
moreover, by an extraordinary gloom, and as we went perceived that its
lava floor was sprinkled over with a multitude of white objects. Soon we
came to the first of these and found that it was the skeleton of a
human being. Here was a veritable Valley of Dead Bones, thousands upon
thousands of them; a gigantic graveyard.
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