"Don't you think the danger is now past, my Nigel ?" "For us, it may be.

But if the crater has really become active.

I fear that our poor people at San Cristobal will be in very great danger indeed." "No! God alone--Hearken!" A muffled peal of thunder which seemed to come from the very bowels of the earth, followed by a detonation like the discharge of an army's artillery, and the sides of the crater opened, and with a wild roar the pent-up torrent burst forth, and leaping into the lake, rolled, a mighty avalanche of water, toward the doomed oasis.
We looked at each other in speechless dismay.

Nothing could resist that terrible flood; it would sweep everything before it, for, though its violence might be lessened before it reached the sea, only the few who happened to be near the coast could escape destruction.
Nobody spoke; the roar of the cataract deafened us, the awfulness of the catastrophe made us dumb.

We were as if stunned, and I was conscious of nothing save a sickening sense of helplessness and despair.
For an hour we stood watching the outpouring of the water.