Just then a soft rain began to fall.  It was warm, and, on examination at the binnacle lamp, turned out to be mud.  Slight at first, it soon poured down in such quantities that in ten minutes it lay six inches thick on the deck, and the crew had to set to work with shovels to heave it overboard.  At this time there was seen a continual roll of balls of white fire down the sides of the peak of Rakata, caused, doubtless, by the ejection of white-hot fragments of lava.  Then showers of masses like iron cinders fell on the brig, and from that time onward till four o’clock of the morning of the 27th, explosions of indescribable grandeur continually took place, as if the mountains were in a continuous roar of terrestrial agony—­the sky being at one moment of inky blackness, the next in a blaze of light, while hot, choking, and sulphurous smells almost stifled the voyagers.

At this point the captain again became anxious about Kathleen and went below.  He found her in the same place and attitude—­still fascinated!

“My child,” he said, taking her hand, “you must lie down and rest.”

“Oh! no.  Do let me stay up,” she begged, entreatingly.

“But you must be tired—­sleepy.”

“Sleepy! who could sleep with such wonders going on around?  Pray don’t tell me to go to bed!”

It was evident that poor Kathy had the duty of obedience to authority still strong upon her.  Perhaps the memory of the Holbein nursery had not yet been wiped out.

“Well, well,” said the captain with a pathetic smile, “you are as safe—­comfortable, I mean—­here as in your berth or anywhere else.”

As there was a lull in the violence of the eruption just then, the captain left Kathleen in the cabin and went on deck.  It was not known at that time what caused this lull, but as it preceded the first of the four grand explosions which effectually eviscerated—­emptied—­the ancient crater of Krakatoa, we will give, briefly, the explanation of it as conjectured by the men of science.

Lying as it did so close to the sea-level, the Krakatoa volcano, having blown away all its cones, and vents, and safety-valves—­from Perboewatan southward, except the peak of Rakata—­let the sea rush in upon its infernal fires.  This result, ordinary people think, produced a gush of steam which caused the grand terminal explosions.  Vulcanologists think otherwise, and with reason—­which is more than can be said of ordinary people, who little know the power of the forces at work below the crust of our earth!  The steam thus produced, although on so stupendous a scale, was free to expand and therefore went upwards, no doubt in a sufficiently effective gust and cloud.  But nothing worthy of being named a blow-up was there.