Landing at a noble quay of red granite, we climbed the steep and shaggy sides of the mountain by a sacred and winding avenue, bordered with blooming trees and statuary.  Most of the figures were exquisitely carved in a white wood or stone, having a pearly sheen, and represented the former priestesses of the Temple, or illustrated the animating spirit of the cult.

On gaining the summit we found ourselves at the brim of a spacious hollow or basin, which in past ages must have been the crater of the volcanic peak.  The grassy slopes of the basin were laid out in flower gardens and terraces of coloured marbles, shaded with sombre trees, and ornamented with sculpture.  In the bottom lay an oval sheet of water a mile long or more, and from the midst of it, towards the near end, a beautiful islet, crowned by a magnificent temple, rose like a mirage to the view, and seemed to float on its glassy bosom.

Words of mine cannot give any idea of that sublime architecture, which resembled no earthly order, though it seemed to partake of both the Saracenic and the Indian.  Fragrant timber, precious stones, and burnished metals; in fine, the richest materials known to the builders, had been united with consummate art into one harmonious emblem of their faith.  The first beams of the rising sun blazed on its golden roof and fretted pinnacles of diamond, and ruby, sapphire, topaz, and emerald; but the lower part was still in shadow.  Nevertheless, we could distinguish a grand portal in the southern front, which faced the sun, and a broad flight of marble steps descending from it into the water; but the massive doors were shut, and not a soul was to be seen about the temple.

As the worshippers arrived they seated themselves on the turf amongst the flowering shrubs, or on the benches along the terraces, and either spoke in subdued tones, or preserved a religious silence.  Otare led us to a kind of throne or stand facing the temple, and raised above the other seats, where his father, as chief of the community, sat in state.  Dinus received us with his usual gracious dignity, and gave us chairs on his right and left hand.

From this height we enjoyed a splendid panorama of the Craterland, at least that portion which had already caught the sunshine.  It lay beneath us like a picture, the surface rising in a series of zones from the central sea, which mirrored the serene azure and plume-like vapours of the heavens, through the sweet meadows, and the smiling gardens, to the luxuriant wilderness beyond; and we could plainly see the shadow of the bounding rampart shrink towards the south as the sun mounted higher and higher.

It was a lovely dawn.  A rosy mist hung like a veil of gauze over the southern sky, and from behind a bar of purple cloud, lined with gold, which rested on the summit of the cliffs, a coronet of auroral beams or crepuscular rays, blue on a pink ground, shot upwards, heralding the advent of the sun, and reminding me of the ancient simile of the earth as a bride awaiting the arrival of her lord.