The wonders of the world

“But this extract is not to be compared for power to the following from the same poem, describing an Alpine sunset after a day of mist and storm upon the mountains.

“There was a time during the middle ages, when Chamouny was inhabited by monks. The reigning lord of the country made a present of the whole valley to a convent of Benedictine friars, in the eleventh century. Two English travelers, Messrs. Pococke and Windham, drew attention to its wonderful scenery in 1741, and now it is a grand highway of summer travel, visited annually by three or four thousand people. A visit to Mont Blanc has become a pilgrimage of fashion. Fashion does some good things in her day; and it is a great thing to have the steps of men directed into this grand temple of nature, who would otherwise be dawdling the summer perhaps at immoral watering-places. A man can hardly pass through the vale of Chamouny, before the awful face of Mont Blanc, and not feel that he is an immortal being. The great mountain looks with an eye, and speaks with a voice, that does something to wake the soul out of its slumbers.

“The sublime hymn by Coleridge, in the vale before sunrise, is the concentrated expression of all the inspiring and heaven-directing influences of the scenery. The poem is as remarkably distinguished above the whole range of poetry in our language, for its sublimity, as the mountain itself among all the great ranges of the Alps. I am determined to quote it in full, for that and the tour of Mont Blanc ought to go together; and I will present along with it the German original of the poem in twenty lines, nearly as translated by Coleridge’s admiring and affectionate relative. I am not aware that Coleridge himself ever visited the vale of Chamouny; and if not, then that wonderful hymn to Mont Blanc was the work of imagination solely, building on the basis of the original lines in German. This was a grand and noble foundation, it is true; but the hymn by Coleridge was a perfect transfiguration of the piece, an inspiration of it with a higher soul, and an investiture of it with garments that shine like the sun. It was the greatest work of the poet’s great and powerful imagination, combined with the deep worshiping sense of spiritual things in his soul.

“On visiting the scene, one is apt to feel as if he could not have written it in the vale itself: the details of the picture would have been somewhat different; and, confined by the reality, one may doubt if even Coleridge’s genius could have gained that lofty ideal point of observation and conception, from which he drew the vast and glorious imagery that rose before him. Not because the poem is more glorious than the reality, for that is impossible; but because, in painting from the reality, the force and sublimity of his general conceptions would have been weakened by the attempt at faithfulness in the detail, and nothing like the impression of the aerial grandeur of the scene, its despotic unity in the imagination, notwithstanding its variety, would have been conveyed to the mind.

“Yet there are parts of it which at sunrise or sunset either, the poet might have written from the very windows of his bedroom, if he had been there in the dawn and evenings of days of such extraordinary brilliancy and glory, as marked and filled the atmosphere, during our sojourn in that blessed region. A glorious region it is, much nearer heaven than our common world, and carrying a sensitive, rightly constituted mind far up in spirit toward the gates of heaven, toward God, whose glory is the light of heaven, and of whose power and majesty the mountains, ice-fields and glaciers, whether beneath the sun, moon, or stars, are a dim, though grand and glittering, symbol. ‘Fire and hail, snow and vapor, stormy wind, fulfilling His word, mountains and all hills, fruitful trees and all cedars, praise the Lord. He looketh on the earth and it trembleth; He toucheth the hills, and they smoke.’

“The following is the original German hymn, in what the translator denominates a very bald English translation, to be compared as a curiosity with its glorification in Coleridge. It occupies but five stanzas of four lines, and is entitled, ‘Chamouny at Sunrise. To Klopstock.’ I have here put it into the metrical form of the original.

“This is very grand. Who but a mighty poet, one seeing with ‘the vision and the faculty divine’—what, but a transfusing, all-conquering imagination—would have dared the attempt to compose another poem on the same subject, or to carry this to a greater hight of sublimity, by melting it down anew, so to speak, and pouring it out into a vaster, more glorious mold? The more one thinks of it, the more he will see, in the poem so produced, a proof most remarkable, of the spontaneous, deep-seated, easily exerted, and almost exhaustless power and originality of Coleridge’s genius. Now let us peruse, ‘with mute thanks and secret ecstacy,’ his own solemn and stupendous lines.

[Besides the rivers Arve and Arveiron, which have their sources in the foot of Mont Blanc, five conspicuous torrents rush down its sides; and, within a few paces of the glaciers, the Gentiana Major grows in immense numbers, with its ‘flowers of loveliest blue.’]

“Thanks to thee, thou noble poet, for giving this glorious voice to Alpine nature, for so befitting and not unworthy an interpretation of Nature’s own voice, in words of our own mother-tongue. Thanks to God for his grace vouchsafed to thee, so that now thou praisest Him amidst the infinite host of flaming seraphs, before the mount supreme of glory, where all the empyrean rings with angelic hallelujahs! The creation of such a mind as Coleridge’s, is only outdone by its redemption through the blood of the Lamb. Oh, who can tell the rapture of a soul, that could give a voice for nations to such a mighty burst of praise to God in this world, when its powers, uplifted in eternity, and dilated with absorbing, unmingled, unutterable love, shall pour themselves forth in the anthem of redemption, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain!”

The three great glaciers, or ice-mountains, which descend from the flanks of Mont Blanc, add their ice to that of the Miage, and present a majestic spectacle, amid the astonishing succession of icy summits, of deep valleys, and of wide chasms, which have become channels for the innumerable torrents and cataracts with which these mountains abound. The view which the glacier of Talafre affords from its center, looking toward the north, is as extraordinary as beautiful. It rises gradually to the base of a semicircular girdle, formed of peaks of granite of a great hight, and terminating in sharp summits, extremely varied in their forms; while the intervals between these peaks are filled up by ice, which falls into this mass, and this mass of ice is crowned by masses of snow, rising in festoons between the black and vertical tables of granite, the steepness of which does not allow them to remain. A ridge of shattered wrecks divides this glacier lengthwise, and forms its most elevated part, being eight thousand, five hundred and thirty-eight feet, or upward of a mile and a half above the level of the sea. This prospect has nothing in common with what is seen in other parts of the world. The immense masses of ice, surrounded and surmounted by pyramidal rocks, still more enormous in magnitude; the contrast between the whiteness of the snow and the obscure colors of the stones, moistened by the water which trickles down their sides; the purity of the air; the dazzling light of the sun, which gives to these objects extraordinary brilliancy; the majestic and awful silence which reigns in these vast solitudes, a silence which is only interrupted at intervals by the noise of some great mass of granite, or of ice, tumbling from the top of the mountain; and the nakedness of these elevated rocks themselves, on which neither animals, shrubs, nor verdure are to be seen, combined with the recollection of the fertile country and rich vegetation which the adjacent valleys at so small a distance present; all tend to produce a mixed impression of admiration and terror, which tempts the spectator to believe, that he has been suddenly transported into a world forgotten by the great Author of nature. One of these glaciers, that of Triolet, is covered with the wrecks of another ice-mountain, which fell some years ago, and buried many huts, flocks, and shepherds beneath its ruins.

THE MER DE GLACE.

These glaciers have their foundation in the wonderful Mer de Glace, or Sea of Ice; shooting up from it their sharp peaks into the frozen air. “To get the best view of it as a whole,” says a modern Alpine tourist, “you cross the meadows in the vale of Chamouny, step over the furious Arve, and climb the mountain precipices to the hight of two thousand feet, by a rough, craggy path, sometimes winding amidst a wood of firs, and sometimes wandering over green grasses. At Montanvert you find yourself on the extremity of a plateau, so situated, that on one side you may look down into the dread frozen sea, and on the other, by a few steps, into the lovely green vale of Chamouny! What astonishing variety and contrast in the spectacle! Far beneath, a smiling and verdant valley, watered by the Arve, with hamlets, fields and gardens, the abode of life, sweet children and flowers; far above, savage and inaccessible crags of ice and granite, and a cataract of stiffened billows, stretching away beyond sight—the throne of death and winter.

“From the bosom of the tumbling sea of ice, huge granite needles shoot into the sky, objects of singular sublimity, one of them rising to the great hight of thirteen thousand feet, seven thousand above the point where you are standing. This is more than double the hight of Mount Washington in our country, and this amazing pinnacle of rock looks like the spire of an interminable colossal cathedral, with other pinnacles around it. No snow can cling to the summits of these jagged spires; the lightning does not splinter them; the tempests rave round them; and at their base, those eternal drifting ranges of snow are formed, that sweep down into the frozen sea, and feed the perpetual, immeasurable masses of the glacier. Meanwhile, the laughing verdure, sprinkled with flowers, plays upon the edges of the enormous masses of ice, so near, that you may almost touch the ice with one hand, and with the other pluck the violet. So, oftentimes, the ice and the verdure are mingled in our earthly pilgrimage; so, sometimes, in one and the same family, you may see the exquisite refinements and the coarse repugnancies of human nature. So, in the same house of God, on the same bench, may sit an angel and a murderer; a villain, like a glacier, and a man with a heart like a sweet running brook in the sunshine.

“The impetuous arrested cataract seems as if it were plowing the rocky gorge with its turbulent surges. Indeed, the ridges of rocky fragments along the edges of the glacier, called moraines, do look precisely as if a colossal iron plow had torn them from the mountain, and laid them along in one continuous furrow on the frozen verge. It is a scene of stupendous sublimity. These mighty granite peaks, hewn and pinnacled into Gothic towers, and these rugged mountain-walls and buttresses—what a cathedral! with this cloudless sky, by starlight, for its fretted roof; the chanting wail of the tempest, and the rushing of the avalanche for its organ. How grand the thundering sound of the vast masses of ice tumbling from the roof of the Arve-cavern at the foot of the glacier! Does it not seem, as it sullenly and heavily echoes, and rolls up from so immense a distance below, even more sublime than the thunder of the avalanche above us? We could tell better if we could have a genuine upper avalanche to compare with it. But what a stupendous scene! ‘I begin now,’ said my companion, ‘to understand the origin of the Gothic architecture.’ This was a very natural feeling; but, after all, it could not have been such a scene, that gave birth to the great idea of that ‘frozen poetry’ of the middle ages. Far more likely it was the sounding aisles of the dim woods, with their checkered green light, and festooned, pointing arches.

“The colossal furrows of rocks and gravel along the edges of the ice at the shores of the sea, are produced by the action of the frost and the avalanches, with the march of the glacier against the sides of the mountains. Nothing can be more singular than these ridges of mountain debris, apparently plowed up and worked off by the moving of the whole bed of ice down the valley. Near the shore, the sea is turbid with these rocks and gravel; but as you go out into the channel, the ice becomes clearer and more glittering, the crevices and fissures deeper and more dangerous, and all the phenomena more astonishing. Deep, blue, pellucid founts of ice-cold water lie in the opening gulfs; and sometimes, putting your ear to the yawning fissures, you may hear the rippling of the rills below, that from the bosom of the glacier are hurrying down to constitute the Arve, bursting furiously forth from the great ice-cavern in the valley.

“This Mer de Glace is an easy and excellent residence for the scientific study of the glaciers, a subject of very great interest, formerly filled with mysteries, which the bold and persevering investigations and theories of some modern naturalists have quite cleared up. The strange movements of the glaciers, their apparent willful rejection of extraneous bodies and substances to the surface and the margin, their increase and decrease, long remained invested with something of the supernatural: they seemed to have a soul and a life of their own. They look motionless and silent, yet they are always moving and sounding on, and they have great voices that give prophetic warning of the weather to the shepherds of the Alps. Scientific men have set up huts upon the sea, and landmarks on the mountains opposite, to test the progress of the icy masses, and in this way it was found that a cabin constructed by Professor Hugi on the glacier of the Aar, had traveled, between the years 1827 and 1840, a distance of forty-six hundred feet. It is supposed that the Mer de Glace moves down between four and five hundred feet annually.

“It is impossible to form a grander image of the rigidity and barrenness, the coldness and death of winter, than when you stand among the billows of one of these frozen seas; and yet it is here that Nature locks up in her careful bosom the treasures of the Alpine valleys, the sources of rich summer verdure and vegetable life. They are hoarded up in winter, to be poured forth beneath the sun, and with the sun in summer. Some of the largest rivers in Europe take their rise from the glaciers, and give to the Swiss valleys their most abundant supply of water, in the season when ordinary streams are dried up. This is a most interesting provision in the economy of nature, for if the glaciers did not exist, those verdant valleys into which the summer sun pours with such fervor, would be parched with drought. So the mountains are parents of perpetual streams, and the glaciers are reservoirs of plenty.

“The derivation of the German name for glacier, gletscher, is suggested as coming not from their icy material, but their perpetual motion, from glitschen, to glide; more probably, however, from the idea of gliding upon their surface. These glaciers come down from the air, down out of heaven, a perpetual frozen motion, ever changing and gliding, from the first fall of snow in the atmosphere, through the state of consolidated grinding blocks of ice, and then into musical streams that water the valleys. First it is a powdery, feathery snow, then granulated like hail, and denominated firn, forming vast beds and sheets around the highest mountain summits, then frozen into masses, by which time it has traveled down to within seven thousand feet above the level of the sea, where commences the great ice-ocean that fills the uninhabitable Alpine valleys, unceasingly freezing, melting and moving down. It has been estimated by Saussure and others, that these seas of ice, at their greatest thickness, are six or eight hundred feet deep. They are traversed by deep fissures, and as they approach the great precipices, over which they plunge like a cataract into the vales, they are split in all directions, and heaved up into waves, reefs, peaks, pinnacles and minarets. Underneath they are traversed by as many galleries and caverns, through which run the rills and torrents constantly gathering from the melting masses above. These innumerable streams, gathering in one as they approach the termination of the glacier, rush out from beneath it, under a great vault of ice, and thus are born into the breathing world, full-grown roaring rivers, from night, frost and chaos.

“A peasant has been known to have fallen into an ice-gulf in one of these seas, near one of the flowing sub-glacial torrents, and following the course of the stream to the foot of the glacier, he came out alive! The German naturalist, Hugi, set out to explore the recesses of one of the glaciers through the bed of a former torrent, and wandered on in its ice-caverns the distance of a mile. ‘The ice was everywhere eaten away into dome-shaped hollows, varying from two to twelve feet in hight, so that the whole mass of the glacier rested at intervals on pillars, or feet of ice, irregular in size and shape, which had been left standing. As soon as any of these props gave way, a portion of the glacier would of course fall in and move on. A dim twilight, scantily transmitted through the mass of ice above, prevailed in these caverns of ice, not sufficient to allow one to read, except close to the fissures, which directly admitted the daylight. The intense blue of the mass of the ice contrasted remarkably with the pure white of the icy stalactites, or pendents descending from the roof. The water streamed down upon him from all sides, so that, after wandering about for two hours, at times bending and creeping, to get along under the low vault, he returned to the open air, quite drenched and half-frozen.’

“This sea of ice, which embosoms in its farthest recesses a little living flower-garden, whither the humble-bees from Chamouny resort for honey, is also bordered by steep lonely beds of the fragrant rhododendron, or rose of the Alps. This hardy and beautiful flower grows from a bush larger than our sweet-fern, with foliage like the leaves of the ivory-plum. It continues blooming late in the season, and sometimes covers vast declivities on the mountains at a great hight, where one would hardly suppose it possible for a handful of earth to cling to the rocky surface. There, amid the snows and ice of a thousand winters, it pours forth its perfume on the air, though there be none to inhale the fragrance, or praise the sweetness, save only ‘the little busy bees,’ that seem dizzy with delight, as they throw themselves into the bosom of these beds of roses.

“Higher still on the opposite side of this great ice-sea, there are mountain-slopes of grass at the base of stupendous rocky pinnacles, whither the shepherds of the Alps drive their herds from Chamouny, for three months’ pasturage. They have no way of getting them there but across the dangerous glacier; and it is said that the passage is a sort of annual celebration, when men, women and children go up to Montanvert, to witness and assist the difficult transportation. When the herds have crossed, one peasant stays with them for the whole three months of their summer excursion, living upon bread and cheese, with one cow among the herd to supply him with milk. When he is not sleeping, he knits stockings, and ruminates as contentedly as the browsing cattle, his only care being to increase his store.”

VIEW FROM THE BUET.

Before we take our leave of Mont Blanc and of the Alps, the peculiarly brilliant view from the summit of the Buet ought to be noticed. Never, says M. Bourrit, did prospect appear so vast. Toward the west, the Rhone is seen, winding for the space of thirty-six leagues through the rich plains of the Valais; the parts of the river which the mountains cover with their shade seeming like threads of silver, and those which the sun illumines like threads of gold. Beyond the river and its rich plains, the view extends to the highest mountains of Switzerland, St. Gothard, and the Grisons, all covered with ice; while on the east, the hights sink suddenly, from some of the loftiest elevations on the globe, to level plains washed by the sea. Geneva seems like a spot at one end of the lake, and the lake itself like a sinuous band, dividing the fields which it waters. Beyond it are discovered the vast plains of Franche Comte and Burgundy, the mountains of which diminish by almost imperceptible gradations. Here the eye has neither power nor extent of sight to embrace the whole of the objects presented to its view. Amid the fearful aspect of the precipices which descend on every side, what a contrast between the country decorated with all that is smiling and gay, and the sublime spectacle of the Alps, their gloomy and aspiring summits, and, above all, the prodigious hight of Mont Blanc, that enormous colossus of snow and ice, which parts the clouds, and pierces to the very heavens! Below this mountain, which bids defiance to time, and whose eternal ice disregards the dissolving power of the sun, a band of pyramidical rocks appear, the intervals between them being so many valleys of ice, the immensity of which appalls the imagination. Their deep chasms may be distinguished, and the noise of the frequent avalanches (falls of immense masses of snow) presents to the mind the gloomy ideas of horror, devastation and ruin. Farther on, other summits of ice prolong this majestic picture. Among these are the high mountains of the St. Bernard, and those which border on the Boromean islands.

Perhaps there is not in the old world a theater more instructive, or more adapted for reflection, than the summit of this mountain. Where, beside, can be seen such variety and contrast of forms; such results of the efforts of time; such effects of all the climates, and of all the seasons? At one glance may be embraced frosts equally intense with those of Lapland, and the rich and delightful frontiers of Italy; eternal ice, and waving harvests; all the chilling horrors of winter, and the luxuriant vegetation of summer; eighty leagues of fertile plains, covered with towns, with vineyards, with fields and herds, and adjoining to these, a depth of twenty thousand feet of everlasting ice.

This Spanish mountain, which has been so long celebrated on account of the singularity of its shape, but chiefly for its convent and its numerous hermitages, is nine leagues north-west of Barcelona, in the province of Catalonia. It is in hight only three thousand, three hundred feet above the level of the sea, but it commands an enchanting prospect of the fine plain of Barcelona, extending to the sea, as well as of the islands of Majorca and Minorca, distant one hundred and fifty miles.

Toward Barcelona this mountain presents a bold and rugged front; but on the west, toward Vacarisas, it is almost perpendicular, notwithstanding which, a carriage-road winds round to the convent, which is placed in a sheltered recess among the rocks, at about half the hight of the mountain. The Llobregat roars at the bottom; and the rock presents perpendicular walls from the edge of the water: but above the convent, the mountain divides into two crowns or cones, which form the most prominent features; while smaller pinnacles, blanched and bare, and split into pillars, pipes, and other singular shapes, give a most picturesque effect. Here are seen fourteen or fifteen hermitages, which are scattered over different points of the mountain, some of them on the very pinnacles of the cones, to which they seem to grow, while others are placed in cavities hewn out of the loftiest pyramids. The highest accessible part of the mountain is above the hermitage of St. Maddelena, the descent from which is between two cones, by a flight of steps, called Jacob’s ladder, leading into a valley which runs along the summit of the mountain. The cones are here in the most grotesque shapes, the southern one being named the Organ, from its resemblance to a number of pipes.

At the extremity of this valley, which is a perfect shrubbery, and on an eminence, stands the hermitage of St. Jerome, the highest and most remote of all; and near it is the loftiest station of the whole mountain, on which is a little chapel dedicated to the Virgin. From this elevated pinnacle the prospect is vast and splendid.

Although the elements have wreaked all their fury on these shattered peaks, yet Nature has not been sparing in her gifts; the spaces between the rocks being filled up with close woods, while numerous evergreens, and other plants, serve to adorn the various chasms, rendering them valuable depositories of the vegetable kingdom. Few, indeed, are the evergreens of Europe which may not be found here; and when the mountain was visited by Mr. Swinburne, the apothecary of the convent had a list of four hundred and thirty-seven species of plants, and forty of trees, which shoot up spontaneously, and grace this hoary and venerable pile. There being two springs only on the mountain, there is a scarcity of water, which is chiefly collected in cisterns; an inconvenience, however, which is in a great measure counterbalanced by the absence of wolves, bears, and other wild beasts.

Captain Carlton, an Englishman, who visited Montserrat some years ago, ascended to the loftiest hermitage, that of St. Jerome, by the means of spiral steps hewn out in the rock on account of the steep acclivity. This, he observes, could not, in his time, be well accomplished by a stranger, without following the footsteps of an old ass, who carried from the convent a daily supply of food to the hermits. This animal having his two panniers stored with the provisions divided into portions, climbed without a guide, and having stopped at each of the cells, where the hermit took the portion allotted to him, returned back to the convent. He found that one of these hermits, to beguile the wearisomeness of his solitude, had contrived so effectually to tame the birds which frequented the groves surrounding his hermitage, that he could draw them together with a whistle, when they perched on his head, breast, and shoulders, taking the food from his mouth.

The convent is situated on the eastern side of the mountain, which seems to have been split by vast torrents of water, or by some violent convulsion of nature: in this way a platform has been formed in the cleft, sufficiently ample for the purpose of its construction. It is one of the forty-five religious houses of the Spanish congregation of the order of St. Benedict. The monks are bound to supply food and lodging for three days to all pilgrims who come up to pay their homage to the Virgin; besides which, they entertain the hermits on Sundays. The latter, who make a vow never to quit the mountain, take their stations by seniority, the junior hermit being placed at the greatest distance from the convent, and descending progressively as the vacancies happen. They are not altogether idle, taking pains to rival each other in making basket-work and other fanciful productions, which they display with great affability to their visitors. They assemble every morning to hear mass and perform divine service, in the parish church of St. Cecilia, which lies considerably above the convent; and twice a week they confess and communicate. They wear their beards long, and are clad in brown.

The church of St. Cecilia is a gloomy edifice, the gilding of which is much sullied by the smoke of eighty-five silver lamps, of various forms and sizes, suspended round the cornice of the sanctuary. For the supply of these with oil, funds have been bequeathed by devotees. The choir is decorated with wood carvings, curiously wrought, representing the most prominent passages in the life of Christ.

THE PEAK OF TENERIFFE.

The island of Teneriffe has received its present name from the inhabitants of the adjacent island Palma, in whose language tener signifies snow, and iffe, a hill. In extent, wealth, and fertility it exceeds all the other Canary islands. It continues to rise on all sides from the sea, until it terminates in the celebrated peak represented in the cut, which is, however, situated rather in the southern part than in the center of the island. The ascent on the north side is more gradual than at the other parts, there being a space along the shore about three leagues in breadth, bounded on the sides by high mountains, or rather cliffs; but more inland it rises like a hanging garden all the way, without any considerable interruption of hills or valleys. The form of this island is triangular, extending itself into three capes, the nearest of which is about eighty leagues from the coast of Africa. In the middle it is divided by a ridge of mountains, which have been compared to the roof of a church, the peak forming the spire or steeple in the center.

The elevation of the peak of Teneriffe, according to the most accurate measurement, made by Cordier, is twelve thousand, one hundred and sixty-six feet, or nearly two miles and one-third above the level of the sea. In the ascent, the first eminence is called Monte Verde, or the green mountain, from the high fern with which it is covered, and presents a level plain of considerable extent. Beyond this is the mountain of pines, which are said to have formerly grown there in great abundance; but its steep sides are now craggy and barren, and its whole appearance very different from that of the eminence described above. After passing this summit, the traveler reaches a plain, on which the natives have bestowed the name of Mouton de Trigo, and upon which the peak in reality stands. It is a mountainous platform, rising more than seven thousand feet, or nearly a mile and a half, above the level of the sea; and here the currents of lava, hitherto concealed by the vegetation, begin to appear in all their aridity and confusion, a few lowly shrubs and creeping plants alone diversifying the surface of a desert, the most arid and rugged that can be imagined.

A small sandy platform of pumice-stones, bordered by two enormous currents of vitreous lava, and blocks of the same nature, ranged in a semicircle, forms what is called the station of the English, on account of the peak having been so often visited by British travelers. This platform is ninety-seven hundred and eighty-six feet, or upward of a mile and three-quarters above the level of the sea; and beyond it the acclivity is very steep, great masses of scoriæ, extremely rough and sharp, covering the currents of lava. Toward the summit, nothing but pumice-stone is to be seen. In fact the peak can only be ascended on the east and south-east sides. As it is impossible to get round the crater, the traveler’s progress is arrested at the spot at which he reaches it. Here the two orders of volcanic substances are to be seen, the modern lavas being thrown up amid the ruins of ejections much more ancient, the immense masses of which constitute the platform on which the peak is placed. The shattered sides present a series of thick beds, almost all plunging toward the sea, composed alternately of ashes, volcanic sand, pumice-stones, lavas, either compact or porous, and scoriæ.

An incalculable number of currents, comparatively recent, which have descended from the peak, or have issued from its flanks, form irregular furrows, which run along the more ancient masses, and lose themselves in the sea to the west and north. Among these currents more than eighty craters are scattered, and augment with their ruins the confusion which prevails throughout.

The crater can alone be reached by descending down three chasms. Its sides are absolutely precipitous within, and are most elevated toward the north. Its form is elliptical; its circumference about twelve hundred feet; and its depth according to Cordier, one hundred and ten feet. Humboldt, however, estimates it at not more than from forty to sixty feet. The sides are, agreeably to the former of these observers, formed of an earth of snowy whiteness, resulting from the decomposition of the blackest and hardest vitreous porphyritic lava. All the rest is solid, and the lowest part occupied by blocks, which have fallen down from the sides. These solid parts are covered with shining crystals of sulphur, of a rhomboidal and octahedral figure, some of which are nearly an inch high, and are, perhaps, the finest specimens of native volcanic sulphur yet known. Vapors issue in abundance from among these blocks, and from an infinity of fissures which preserve a very intense heat. These vapors consist solely of sulphur and water, perfectly insipid. Beside the incrustations of sulphur, opal, in thin plates, is formed with great celerity. Humboldt regards the peak of Teneriffe as an enormous basaltic mountain, resting upon a dense secondary calcareous stone.

Various travelers have asserted, that the cold is intensely keen on the summit of the peak; that respiration is difficult; and that, particularly, spirituous liquors lose all their strength; which latter circumstance they ascribe to the spirit being more or less exposed to the sulphureous fumes exhaled from the crater. Cordier, and several other accurate observers, declare, however, that neither the smell nor the strength of liquids appeared, at this elevation, to be in the least degree impaired; and that volatile alkali, ether, and spirit of wine, possessed their usual pungency. They add, that the cold is very supportable; and that neither the aqueous sulphureous vapors, nor the rarity of the air, render breathing difficult.

We extract the following interesting particulars from Humboldt’s account of his visit to Teneriffe.

“Toward three in the morning, by the sombrous light of a few fir torches, we began our expedition for the summit of the Piton. We scaled the volcano on the north-east, where the declivities are extremely steep; and came, after two hours’ toil, to a small plain, which on account of its isolated situation, bears the name of Alta Vista. It is the station also of the Neveros, those natives whose occupation it is to collect ice and snow, which they sell in the neighboring towns. Their mules, better practiced in climbing mountains than those hired by travelers, reach Alta Vista, and the Neveros are obliged to transport the snow to this place on their backs. Above this point the Malpays begins; a term by which is designated here, as well as in Mexico, Peru, and every other country subject to volcanoes, a ground destitute of vegetable mold, and covered with fragments of lavas.

“We observed, during the twilight, a phenomenon which is not unusual on high mountains, but which the position of the volcano we were scaling rendered very striking. A layer of white and fleecy clouds concealed from us the sight of the ocean, and the lower region of the island. This layer did not appear above sixteen hundred yards high; the clouds were so uniformly spread, and kept so perfect a level, that they wore the appearance of a vast plain covered with snow. The colossal pyramid of the peak, the volcanic summits of Lanzerota, of Fortaventura, and the isle of Palma, were like rocks amidst this vast sea of vapors, and their black tints were in fine contrast with the whiteness of the clouds.”

By an astronomical observation, made at the above elevation at sunrise, it was ascertained that the true horizon, that is, a part of the sea, was distant one hundred and thirty miles. Our traveler proceeds thus:

“We had yet to scale the steepest part of the mountain, the Piton, which forms the summit. The slope of this small cone, covered with volcanic ashes, and fragments of pumice-stone, is so steep, that it would have been almost impossible to reach the top, had we not ascended by an old current of lava, the wrecks of which have resisted the ravages of time. These wrecks form a wall of scorious rocks, which stretches itself into the midst of the loose ashes. We ascended the Piton by grasping these half-decomposed scoriæ, the sharp edges of which remained often in our hands. We employed nearly half an hour to scale a hill, the perpendicular hight of which does not exceed five hundred feet.

“When we gained the summit of the Piton, we were surprised to find scarcely room enough to seat ourselves conveniently. The west wind blew with such violence that we could scarcely stand. It was eight in the morning, and we were frozen with cold, though the thermometer kept a little above the freezing point.

“The wall, which surrounds the crater like a parapet, is so high, that it would be impossible to reach the Caldera, if on the eastern side there was not a breach, which seems to have been the effect of a flowing of very old lava. We descended through this breach toward the bottom of the tunnel, the figure of which is elliptical. The greatest breadth of the mouth appeared to us to be three hundred feet, the smallest two hundred feet.

“We descended to the bottom of the crater on a train of broken lava, from the eastern breach of the inclosure. The heat was perceptible only in a few crevices, which gave vent to aqueous vapors, with a peculiar buzzing noise. Some of these funnels or Crevices are on the outside of the inclosure, on the external brink of the parapet that surrounds the crater. We plunged the thermometer into them, and saw it rise rapidly to sixty-eight and seventy-five degrees.

“We prolonged in vain our stay on the summit of the peak, to wait the moment when we might enjoy the view of the whole of the archipelago of the Fortunate islands. We discovered Palma, Gomera, and the Great Canary, at our feet. The mountains of Lanzerota, free from vapors at sunrise, were soon enveloped in thick clouds. On a supposition only of an ordinary refraction, the eye takes in, in calm weather, from the summit of the volcano, a surface of the globe of fifty-seven hundred square leagues, equal to a fourth of the surface of Spain.

“Notwithstanding the heat we felt in our feet on the edge of the crater, the cone of ashes remains covered with snow during several months in the winter. It is probable, that under the cap of snow considerable hollows are found, like those we find under the glaciers of Switzerland, the temperature of which is constantly less elevated than that of the soil on which they repose. The cold and violent wind which blew from the time of sunrise, engaged us to seek shelter at the foot of the Piton. Our hands and faces were frozen, while our boots were burnt by the soil on which we walked. We descended in the space of a few minutes the sugar-loaf, which we had scaled with so much toil; and this rapidity was in part involuntary, for we often rolled down on the ashes. It was with regret that we quitted this solitary place, this domain where Nature towers in all her majesty.”

To the above we subjoin the following extract from the account published in the first volume of the Transactions of the Geological Society, by the Hon. Mr. Bennet.

At the distance of thirty-four leagues from the island, Mr. Bennet had a very distinct view of the peak, rising like a cone from the bed of the ocean. The rocks and strata of Teneriffe, he observes, are wholly volcanic, the long chain of mountains, which may be termed the central chain, traversing the island from the foot of the second region of the peak, and sloping down on the eastern, western and northern sides, to the sea. Toward the south, or more properly the south-south-west, the mountains are nearly perpendicular, and though broken into ridges, and occasionally separated by deep ravines, that are cut transversely as well as longitudinally, there are none of those plains, nor that gradual declination of strata, which the south-eastern and north-western sides of the island exhibit.

Mr. Bennet ascended the peak in the month of September, 1810. We give the abridged details of this expedition in his own words.

“The road to the city of Orotava, is a gradual and easy slope for three or four miles, through a highly cultivated country. Leaving the town, after a steep ascent of about an hour, through a deep ravine, we quitted the cultivated part, and entered into forests of chestnuts, the trees of which are of a large size. The form of this forest is oblong; the soil is deep, and formed of decomposed lava, small ash and pumice. I examined several channels in the strata, or ravines worn by the rains, and there was no appearance of any other rock. Leaving this forest, the track passes over a series of green hills, which we traversed in about two hours, and at last halted to water our mules at a spot where there is a small spring of bad and brackish water issuing from a lava rock. The ravine is of considerable depth. The range of green hills extends a mile or two further, the soil shallowing by degrees, until at length the trees and shrubs gradually dwindling in size, the Spanish broom alone covers the ground. Leaving behind us this range of green hills, the track, still ascending, leads for several hours across a steep and difficult mass of lava-rock, broken here and there into strange and fantastic forms, worn into deep ravines, and scantly covered in places by a thin layer of yellow pumice. As we proceeded on our road, the hills on our left gradually rose in hight, till the summits were lost in those of the central chain; while, on our right, we were rapidly gaining an elevation above the lower range of the peak. We met with several small conical hills, or mouths of extinct volcanoes, the decomposed lava on the edges of the craters having a strong red ochreous tint. At length, an immense undulated plain spreads itself like a fan, on all sides, nearly as far as the eye can reach. This plain is bounded on the west-south-west and south-south-west, by the regions of the peak; and on the east and north-east, by a range of steep perpendicular precipices and mountains, many leagues in circumference, called by the Spaniards Las Faldas. On this plain, or desert, for we had long left all show of vegetation, except a few stunted plants of Spanish broom, a sensible change was felt in the atmosphere; the wind was keen and sharp, and the climate like that of England in the months of autumn. All here was sad, silent and solitary. We saw at a distance the fertile plains on the coast, lying as it were under our feet, and affording a cheerful contrast to the scenes of desolation with which we were surrounded. We were already seven or eight thousand feet above the level of the sea, and had reached the bottom of the second region of the peak.

“Having reached the end of the plain, we found ourselves at the bottom of a steep hill, at the foot of which is a mass or current of lava. After a laborious, not to say hazardous ascent of about an hour, the pumice and ash gave way, and the mules sinking knee-deep at every step, we arrived at about five in the afternoon at the other extremity of the stream of lava, which, descending from the summit of the second region of the peak, divides at the foot of the cone into two branches, the one running to the north-east, and the other to the north-west. It was here we were to pass the night; so, lighting a fire made of dry branches of the Spanish broom, and stretching a part of a sail over a portion of the rock, we ate our dinner and laid ourselves down to sleep. I, however, passed the best part of the night by the fire, the weather being piercingly cold. As I stood by the fire, the view all around me was wild and terrific; the moon rose about ten at night, and, though in her third quarter, gave sufficient light to show the waste and wilderness by which we were surrounded. The peak and the upper regions which we had yet to ascend, towered awfully above our heads, while below, the mountains that had appeared of such a hight in the morning, and had cost us a day’s labor to climb, lay stretched as plains at our feet. From the uncommon rarity of the atmosphere, the whole vault of heaven appeared studded with innumerable stars, while the valleys of Orotava were hidden from our view by a thin vail of light fleecy clouds, that floated far beneath the elevated spot we had chosen for our resting-place; the solemn stillness of the night was only interrupted by the crackling of the fire round which we stood, and by the whistling of the wind, which coming in hollow gusts from the mountain, resembled the roar of distant cannon.

“Between two and three in the morning, we resumed, on foot, our ascent of the mountain, the lower part of which we had climbed on horseback the preceding evening; the ascent, however, became much more rapid and difficult, our feet sinking deep in the ashes at every step. From the uncommon sharpness of the acclivity, we were obliged to stop often to take breath: after several halts, we at last reached the head of the pumice hill. After resting some short time here, we began to climb the stream of lava, stepping from mass to mass. The ascent is steep, painful and hazardous; in some places the stream of lava is heaped up in dykes or embankments; and we were obliged to clamber over them as one ascends a steep wall.

“We halted several times during the ascent, and at last reached a spot called La Cueva, one of the numerous caves that are found on the sides of the mountain; this is the largest of them, and is filled with snow and the most delicious water, which was just at the point of congelation. The descent into it is difficult, it being thirty or forty feet deep. One of our party let himself down by a rope: he could not see the extent of the cave, but the guides declared it to be three hundred feet in length, and to contain thirty or forty feet of water in depth. The roof and sides are composed of a fine stalactitic lava, similar to that found on Vesuvius, and it is of the same nature as that which flowed on the surface. We rested here about half an hour, during which we had an opportunity of observing the rising of the sun, and that singular and rapid change of night into day, which is the consequence of an almost entire absence of twilight. As we ascended the north-east side of the mountain, this view was strikingly beautiful: at first there appeared a bright streak of red on the horizon, which gradually spread itself, lighting up the heavens by degrees, and growing brighter and brighter, till at last the sun burst forth from the bed of the ocean, gilding as it rose the mountains of Teneriffe, and those of the Great Canary; in a short time the whole country to the eastward lay spread out as a map. The Great Canary was easily to be distinguished; and its rugged and mountainous character, similar to that of the other islands, became visible to the naked eye. The cold at this time was intense, the wind keen and strong, and the thermometer sunk to thirty-two degrees. After a short though rapid ascent, we reached the summit of the second stage of the mountain, passing over a small plain of white pumice, on which were spread masses of lava, and at length arrived at the foot of the cone. This division of the mountain forms what is generally termed the peak of Teneriffe: it represents the present crater of Vesuvius, with this difference, however, that while the surface of that mountain is composed of a black cinder or ash, the superfices of this appear to be a deposit of pumice of a white color, of scoriæ and lava, with here and there considerable masses that were probably thrown out when the volcano was in action. Numerous small cavities on the side of the mountain emitted vapor, with considerable heat. Here begins the only fatiguing part of the ascent; the steepness of the cone is excessive; at each step our feet sunk into the ash, and large masses of pumice and lava rolled down from above; we were all bruised, and our feet and legs were cut, but not materially hurt: at last we surmounted all difficulties, and seated ourselves on the highest ridge of the mountain. This uppermost region does not appear to contain in superficies more than an acre and a half, and is itself a small crater, the walls of which are the different points on which we sat, and are plainly visible from below. Within, the lava is in the most rapid state of decomposition. The surface is hot to the feet, and the guides said it was dangerous to remain long in one spot: as it was, some of us sunk to our knees in the hot deposit of sulphur. Upon striking the ground with the feet, the sound is hollow, similar to what is produced by the same impulsion on the craters of Vesuvius and Solfaterra. I estimate the depth of the crater to be, from the highest ridge to the bottom, about two hundred feet, forming an easy and gradual descent.

“The view from the summit is stupendous: we could plainly discover the whole form of the island, and we made out distinctly three or four of the islands, which, collectively, are called the Canaries; we could not, however, see Lancerotte or Fuerteventura, though we were told that other travelers had distinguished them all.

“From this spot, the central chain of mountains that run from south-west to north-east, is easily to be distinguished. These, with the succession of fertile and woody valleys, commencing from San Ursula, and ending at Las Horcas, with the long line of precipitous lava rocks that lay on the right of our ascent, and which traverse that part of the island running from east to west, from their point of departure at the Canales, to where they end in an abrupt headland on the coast, with their forests, and villages, and vineyards, the port with the shipping in the roads, the town of Orotava, with its spires glittering as the morning sun burst upon them, afford a cheerful contrast to the streams of lava, the mounds of ash and pumice, and the sulphurated rock on which we had taken our seat. The sensation of extreme hight was in fact one of the most extraordinary I ever felt; and though I did not find the pain in my chest arising from the rarity of the atmosphere, by any means so acute as on the mountains of Switzerland, yet there was a keenness in the air, independent of the cold, that created no small uneasiness in the lungs. The respiration became short and quick, and repeated halts were found necessary. The idea also of extreme hight was to me more determinate and precise than on the mountains of Switzerland; and though the immediate objects of vision were not so numerous, yet as the ascent is more rapid, the declivity sharper, and there is here no mountain like Mont Blanc towering above you, the twelve thousand feet above the level of the sea appeared considerably more than a similar elevation above the lake of Geneva. We remained at the summit about three-quarters of an hour, our ascent having cost us the labor of four hours, as we left La Estancia at ten minutes before three, and reached the top of the peak before seven. Our thermometer, which was graduated to the scale of Fahrenheit, was, during our ascent, as follows: at Orotava, at eight in the morning, seventy-four degrees; at six in the evening, at La Estancia, fifty degrees; at one, in the following morning, forty-two degrees; at La Cueva, at half past four, thirty-two degrees; at the bottom of the cone, thirty-six degrees; at the top of the peak, one hour and a half after sunrise, thirty-three degrees. The descent down the cone is difficult, from its extreme rapidity, and from the fall of large stones, which loosen themselves from the beds of pumice. Having at last scrambled to the bottom, we pursued our march down the other course of the lava, that is to say, down its westerly side, having ascended its eastern. The ravines and rents in this stream of lava are deep and formidable; the descent into them is always painful and troublesome, often dangerous: in some places we let ourselves down from rock to rock. I can form no opinion why there should be these strange irregularities in the surface of this lava; in places it resembles what sailors term the trough of the sea, and I can compare it to nothing but as if the sea in a storm, had by some force become on a sudden stationary, the waves retaining their swell. As we again approached La Cueva, we came to a singular steep valley, the depth of which, from its two sides, can not be less than one hundred to one hundred and fifty feet, the lava lying in broken ridges one upon the other, similar to the masses of granite rock that time and decay have tumbled down from the top of the Alps; and, except from the scoriæ, or what Milton calls ‘the fiery surge,’ they in no degree bear the marks of having rolled as a stream of liquid matter.

“We descended the pumice hill with great rapidity, almost at a run, and arrived at La Estancia in little more than two hours. We then mounted our mules, and following the track by which we had ascended the preceding day, we reached, about four o’clock, the country-house from which we had started.”

The first eruption of which there is any distinct account, occurred on the twenty-fourth of December, 1704, when twenty-nine shocks of an earthquake were distinctly felt. On the thirty-first a great light was observed on Manja, toward the White mountains. Here the earth opened, and two volcanoes were formed, which threw up such heaps of stones as to raise two considerable mountains: the combustible matter, which still continued to be thrown up, kindled above fifty fires in the vicinity. The whole country for three leagues round was in flames, which were increased by another volcano opening by at least thirty different vents within the circumference of half a mile. On the second of February following, another volcano broke out in the town of Guimar, swallowing up a large church.

A subsequent eruption in 1706 filled up the port of Guarachico. The lava, in its descent, ran five leagues in six hours; and on this lava, houses are now built where ships formerly rode at anchor. Neither of these eruptions was from the crater on the summit of the peak, for that has not ejected lava for centuries, and it now issues from the flanks only. The last eruption was on the ninth of June, 1798, and was very terrible. Three new mouths opened at the hight of eighty-one hundred and thirty feet, or upward of a mile and a half above the level of the sea, upon the inclined slope of the base of the peak toward the south-west. Above this, at the hight of ten thousand, two hundred and forty feet, or nearly two miles, M. Cordier found a vast crater nearly four miles and a half in circumference, which lie ascertained to be very ancient. Its sides are extremely steep, and it still presents the most frightful picture of the violence of subterraneous fire. The peak rises from the sides of this monstrous aperture. To the south-west is the mountain of Cahora, which is said to have become a volcano in 1797. The other mountains of Teneriffe, which tradition reports to have been formerly volcanoes, are Monte Roxo, or the red mountain; several mountains, called the Malpasses, lying to the eastward; and one (Rejada) in a southern direction. Throughout the whole of the distance between Monte Roxo and the bay of Adexe, according to Mr. Glass, the shore is about twenty-five hundred feet, or nearly half a mile in hight, and perpendicular as a wall. The southern coast has a much superior elevation, the chain of mountains by which it is bounded being, agreeably to St. Vincent, eighty-three hundred and twenty feet, or more than a mile and a half, above the level of the sea.

THE SOUFFRIERE MOUNTAIN.

This volcanic mountain, the dreadful eruption of which we are about to describe, is the most elevated and most northerly of the lofty chain running through the West India island of St. Vincent. From the extraordinary frequency and violence of the earthquakes, which in 1811, are calculated to have exceeded two hundred, some great movement or eruption was looked for. In the interim the mountain indicated much disquietude; but the apprehension was not so immediate as to restrain curiosity, or to prevent repeated visits to the crater, which had latterly been more numerous than ever. Even on the twenty-sixth of April, 1812, the day preceding the eruption, several gentlemen ascended and remained there for some time. Nothing unusual was then remarked, nor any external difference observed, except rather a stronger emission of smoke from the interstices of the conical hill, at the bottom of the crater. To those who have not visited this romantic and wonderful spot, a slight description of it, as it lately stood, is previously necessary.

“About two thousand feet from the level of the sea, on the south side of the mountain, and at rather more than two-thirds of its hight, opens a circular chasm, somewhat exceeding half a mile in diameter, and between four hundred and five hundred feet in depth. Exactly in the center of this capacious bowl, rose a conical hill about two hundred and sixty or three hundred feet in hight, and about two hundred in diameter, richly covered and variegated with shrubs, brushwood and vines, above half-way up, and the remainder covered over with virgin sulphur to the top. From the fissures of the cone and interstices of the rocks, a thin white smoke was constantly emitted, occasionally tinged with a slight bluish flame. The precipitous sides of this magnificent amphitheater were fringed with various evergreens and aromatic shrubs, flowers, and many alpine plants. On the north and south sides of the base of the cone were two pieces of water, one perfectly pure and tasteless, the other strongly impregnated with sulphur and alum. This lonely and beautiful spot was rendered more enchanting by the singularly melodious notes of a bird, an inhabitant of these upper solitudes, and altogether unknown to the other parts of the island, hence principally called or supposed to be invisible, though it certainly has been seen, and is a species of blackbird.

“A century had now elapsed since the last convulsion of the mountain, or since any other elements had disturbed the serenity of this wilderness, besides those which are common to the tropical tempest. It apparently slumbered in primeval solitude and tranquillity, and from the luxuriant vegetation and growth of the forest, which covered its side from the base nearly to the summit, seemed to discountenance the fact, and falsify the records of the ancient volcano. Such was the majestic, peaceful Souffriere, on April the twenty-seventh; but our imaginary safety was soon to be confounded by the sudden danger of devastation. Just as the plantation bell rang at noon on that day, an abrupt and dreadful crash from the mountain, with a severe concussion of the earth, and tremulous noise in the air, alarmed all around it. The resurrection of this fiery furnace was proclaimed in a moment by a vast column of thick, black, ropy smoke, like that of an immense glass-house, bursting forth at once, and mounting to the sky; showering down sand, gritty calcined particles of earth and ashes mixed, on all below. This, driven before the wind toward Wallibou and Morne Ronde, darkened the air like a cataract of rain, and covered the ridges, woods and cane-pieces with light gray-colored ashes, resembling snow when slightly covered by dust. As the eruption increased, this continual shower expanded, destroying every appearance of vegetation. At night a very considerable degree of ignition was observed on the lips of the crater; but it is not asserted that there was as yet any visible ascension of flame. The same awful scene presented itself on the following day; the fall of ashes and calcined pebbles still increasing, and the compact, pitchy column from the crater rising perpendicularly to an immense hight, with a noise at intervals like the muttering of distant thunder.

“On Wednesday, the twenty-ninth, all these menacing symptoms of horror and combustion still gathered more thick and terrific for miles around the dismal and half-obscured mountain. The prodigious column shot up with quicker motion, dilating as it rose like a balloon. The sun appeared in total eclipse, and shed a meridian of twilight over us, that aggravated the wintry gloom of the scene, now completely powdered over with falling particles. It was evident that the crisis was yet to come, that the burning fluid was struggling for a vent, and laboring to throw off the superincumbent strata and obstructions, which suppressed its torrent. At night, it was manifest that it had greatly disengaged itself from its burden, by the appearance of fire flashing above the mouth of the crater.

“On the memorable thirtieth of April, the reflection of the rising sun on this majestic body of curling vapor was sublime beyond imagination: any comparison of the Glaciers, or of the Andes, can but feebly convey an idea of the fleecy whiteness and brilliancy of this awful column of intermingled and wreathed smoke and clouds. It afterward assumed a more sulphureous cast, like what are called thunder-clouds, and in the course of the day had a ferruginous and sanguine appearance, with a much livelier action in the ascent, and a more extensive dilatation, as if almost freed from every obstruction. In the afternoon, the noise was incessant, and resembled the approach of thunder still nearer and nearer, with a vibration that affected the feelings and hearing: as yet there was no convulsive motion, or sensible earthquake. The Charaibs settled at Morne Ronde, at the foot of the Souffriere, abandoned their houses, with their live stock, and everything they possessed, and fled precipitately toward town. The negroes became confused, forsook their work, looked up to the mountain, and, as it shook, trembled, with the dread of what they could neither understand or describe: the birds fell to the ground, overpowered with showers of ashes, unable to keep themselves on the wing; the cattle were starving for want of food, as not a blade of grass or a leaf was now to be found; the sea was much discolored, but not uncommonly agitated; and it is remarkable, that throughout the whole of this violent disturbance of the earth, it continued quite passive, and did not at any time sympathize with the agitation of the land. About four o’clock in the afternoon, the noise became more alarming, and just before sunset the clouds reflected a bright copper color, suffused with fire. Scarcely had the day closed, when the flames burst at length pyramidically from the crater, through the mass of smoke; the rolling of the thunder became more awful and deafening; electric flashes quickly succeeded, attended with loud claps; and now, indeed, the tumult began. Those only who have witnessed such a sight, can form any idea of the magnificence and variety of the lightning and electric flashes; some forked and zigzag, playing across the perpendicular column from the crater; others shooting upward from the mouth like rockets of the most dazzling luster; others like shells, with their trailing fuses, flying in different parabolas, with the most vivid scintillations, from the dark sanguine column, which now seemed inflexible, and immovable by the wind. Shortly after seven in the afternoon, the mighty caldron was seen to simmer, and the ebullition of lava to break out on the north-west side. This, immediately after boiling over the orifice, and flowing a short way, was opposed by the acclivity of a higher point of land, over which it was impelled by the immense tide of liquefied fire which drove it on, forming the figure V in grand illumination. Sometimes, when the ebullition slackened, or was insufficient to urge it over the obstructing hill, it recoiled like a refluent billow, from the rock, and then again rushed forward, impelled by fresh supplies, and, surmounting every obstacle, carried rocks and woods together, in its course down the slope of the mountain, until it precipitated itself down some vast ravine, concealed from our sight by the intervening ridges of Morne Ronde. Vast globular bodies of fire were seen projected from the fiery furnace, and, bursting, fell back into it, or over it upon the surrounding bushes, which were instantly set in flames. About four hours from the time of the lava’s boiling over the crater, it reached the sea, as we could observe from the reflection of the fire and electric flashes attending it. About half past one, the following morning, another stream of lava was seen descending to the eastward toward Rabacca. The thundering noise of the mountain, and the vibration of sound that had been so formidable hitherto, now mingled in the sudden monotonous roar of the rolling lava, became so terrible, that dismay was almost turned into despair. At this time the first earthquake was felt; this was followed by showers of cinders, which fell with the hissing noise of hail, during two hours.