There is unquestionably a class of men--especially Englishmen--who are
deeply imbued with the idea that the Universe in general, and our world
in particular, has been created with a view to afford them what they
call fun.

"It would be great fun," said an English commercial man to a friend who
sat beside him, "to go and have a look at this eruption. They say it is
Krakatoa which has broken out after a sleep of two centuries, and as it
has been bursting away now for nearly a week, it is likely to hold on
for some time longer. What would you say to charter a steamer and have a
grand excursion to the volcano?"

The friend said he thought it would indeed be "capital fun!"

We have never been able to ascertain who these Englishmen were, but they
must have been men of influence, or able to move men of influence, for
they at once set to work and organised an excursion.

The place where this excursion was organised was Batavia. Although that
city was situated in Java, nearly a hundred miles distant from Krakatoa,
the inhabitants had not only heard distinctly the explosions of the
volcano, but had felt some quakings of the earth and much rattling of
doors and windows, besides a sprinkling of ashes, which indicated that
the eruption, even in that eruptive region, was of unusual violence.
They little imagined to what mighty throes the solid rocks of Krakatoa
were yet to be subjected before those volcanic fires could find a vent.
Meanwhile, as we have said, there was enough of the unusual in it to
warrant our merchants in their anticipation of a considerable amount of
fun.