been at that time a swell in the sea, or a depression or sinking of the earth under it. From what we have seen lately here, and from what we read of former eruptions of Vesuvius, and of other active volcanoes, their neighbourhood must always be attended with danger; with this consideration, the very numerous population at the foot of Vesuvius is remarkable From Naples to Castel-a-mare, about fifteen miles> is so thickly spread with houses as to be nearly one continued street, and on the Somma side of the volcano, the towns and villages are scarcely a mile from one another; so that for thirty miles, which is the extent of the basis of Mount Vesuvius and Somma, the population may be perhaps more numerous than that of any spot of a like extent in Europe, in spite of the variety of dangers attending such a situation. With the help of the drawings that accompany this account of the late eruption of Vesuvius, and which I can assure you to be faithful representations of what we have seen, I flatter myself I shall have enabled you to have a clear idea of it; and I flatter myself also, that the communication of such a variety of well attested phænomena as have attended this formidable eruption, may not only prove acceptable, but useful to the curious in natural history. In a subsequent letter from Sir William Hamilton to Sir Joseph Banks, dated Castel-a-mare, anciently Stabiæ, Sept. 2, 1794, are the two following remarks, to be added to this paper. 1. Within a mile of this place the mofete are still very active, and particularly under the spot where the ancient town of Stabia was situated. The 24th of August, a young lad by accident falling into a well there that was dry, but full of the mephitic vapour, was immediately suffocated; there were no signs of any hurt from the fall, as the well was shallow. This circumstance called to my mind the death of the elder Pliny, who most probably lost his life by the same sort of mephitic vapours, on this very spot, and which are active after great eruptions of Vesuvius. 2. Mr. James, a British merchant, who now lives in this neighbourhood, assured me that on Tuesday night, the 17th of June, which was the third day after the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, he was in a boat with a sail, near Torre del Greco, when the minute ashes, so often mentioned in my letter, fell thick; and that in the dark they emitted a pale light like phosphorus, so that his hat, those of the boatmen, and the part of the sails that were covered with the ashes, were luminous. Others have mentioned to me the having seen a phosphoric light on Vesuvius after this eruption; but until it was confirmed to me by Mr. James, I did not choose to say any thing about it. [Phil. Trans. 1795.] CHAP. X. ETNA AND ITS ERUPTIONS. SECT. 1.-General History. We have purposely dwelt with considerable minuteness upon the volcanic phænomena of Vesuvius in the preceding chapter, not only because they have been more explicitly detailed than those of any similar mountain, but that we might bring the history of this class of natural wonders as much as possible into one form. In the volcanoes which we shall yet think it our duty to describe, we shall endeavour to confine ourselves to the peculiar and prominent features by which every one is distinguished from every other. Etna is the most striking phænomenon of the island of Sicily; and though less frequently delineated than Vesuvius; is so much more gigantic, that the latter, if placed by the side of it, would seem nothing more than a small ejected hill, and is in fact not longer than several of the mountains by which it is surrounded. The whole circuit of the base of Vesuvius does not exceed thirty miles, while Etna covers a space of a hundred and eighty miles, and its height above the level of the sea is computed at not less than eleven thousand feet; and while the lava of the first not often devolves its stream further than to an extent of seven miles, Etna will emit a liquid fire capable of traversing a path of thirty miles. The crater of Vesuvius, moreover, has seldom exceeded half a mile in circumference, while that of Etna is commonly three, and sometimes six, miles.The best description of this crater, which we have received in our own day, is that given by Spalanzani. According to him, it forms an oval extending from east to west, inclosed by vast fragments of lava and scoriæ; the inner sides being of various declinations, in crusted with orange coloured concretions of muriat of ammonia, the sal ammoniac of the shops. The bottom is a plain nearly horizontal, about two-thirds of a mile in circumference, with a large circular aperture, giving vent to a columu of white smoke, below which is visible a liquid fiery matter, like metal boiling in a furnace. Such is the height of Etna, that its eruptions rarely attain its summit, but more usually break out at its sides. Near the crater begins the region of perpetual snow and ice; which is followed by a woody domain, consisting of vas: forests of oaks, beeches, firs and pines, while the areola of the crater is almost destitute of vegetation. In this middle region appear also chesnut trees of enormous size, one of which, distinguished by the name of cento cavallo (troop of horses) measures not less than two hundred and four feet in circumference. Etna is perhaps one of the oldest volcanoes in Europe; and though less minutely described by modern philosophers and travellers than Vesuvius, obtained far more of the attention of the Greek and Roman writers. The fire which is so perpetually burning in its bowels induced the poets to place in this tremendous cavity the forges of the Cyclops, who were placed under the government of Vulcan, and the prison of the giants who rebelled against Jupiter. These fictions progressively grew into popular truths among the vulgar, who regarded Etna, in consequence, as the residence of Vulcan, aud the seat of his empire. And hence they erected a temple to him on the mountain, in which, according to Elian, a perpetual fire was maintained, in the same manner as in the temple of Vesta, this element being an appropriate Vulcanic symbol. Homer makes mention of Mount Etna, but at the same time takes no notice of its eruptive power; and hence there is a strong presumptive proof that its volcanic properties were unknown at that æra. Thucydides is the earliest historic writer that alludes to these phænomena. He enumerates three eruptions of the mountain to wards the conclusion of his third book, one of which he fixes at four hundred and seventy-four years before the birth of our Saviour, a second fifty years later, while to the third he assigns no date whatPindar composed an ode in the 78th Olympiad, about four or five years after the second eruption, and adverted to by Thucydides, in which he describes its violence, and retains the popular fable just alluded to, that Jupiter had buried the giants in its bowels, and that their struggle to get loose was the cause of the fiery com ever. motion*. Lucretius has referred to the volcanic powers of Etna in various places. In his sixth book he endeavours more philosophi. cally to account for them; and his first describes the island of Sicily so picturesquely, and at the same time pays so elegant a compliment to Empedocles, who was a native of it, that we cannot forbear quoting the passage, which is as follows, v. 717. Quoruin Agragantinus cum primis Empedocles est: Heic est vasta Charybdis, et heic Etnea minanter Thus sung EMPEDOCLES, in honest fame, * Pyth. Od. 1. GOOD. No country, indeed, has a juster right to boast of the men of learning it has produced than ancient Sicily. In proof of which it may be sufficient to add to the name of Empedocles, those of Æschylus, Diodorus Siculus, Gorgias, Euclid, Archimedes, Epicharmus, Theocritus.-Editor. SECTION II. Chronological Account of the several Fires of Mount Etna. To pass by what is related by Berosus, Orpheus, and other less credible authors, about the eruptions of this mountain, both at the time of the ingress of the Ionian colonies into Sicily, and that of the Argonauts (which latter was in the twelfth age before the Christian account;) we shall first take notice of that which happened at the time of the expedition of Æneas, who being terrified by the fire of this then burning mountain, left that island; whereof Virgil, 1. 3, Eneid, gives this notable description - Æneid iii. Ignarique viæ, Cyclopum allabimur oris. Portus ab accessu ventorum immotus et ingens, The wind now sinking with the lamp of day, Her shatter'd entrails wide the mountain throws, PITT. After this we find in Thucydides, that in the 76th olympiad, * As we have no other authority for the eruption here referred to than that of the Æneid, there can be little doubt that the poet invented it to suit his purpose.-Editor. |