TEE ANTILLEAN VOLCANOES. 275 



ward between the gorges of radiating waterways. In general, the 

 mass of northern Martinique bulges upward and outward, a great 

 dome convex toward the sky; but west and southwest of the summit 

 crater there is an irregularly triangular amphitheater, of a form sug- 

 gesting that a segment of the mountain has dropped several hundred 

 feet below the general contour. At the coast line this depression forms 

 the shallow bay of St. Pierre roadstead; and thence to the crest the 

 depressed segment is bounded by rocky walls — sharp divides, cliffs, 

 and lines of mornes, in different places. Almost in the center of this 

 triangular trough sloping down from Pelee crater to the sea stood 

 the city of St. Pierre, the metropolis of Martinique — that gem of the 

 Antilles which must always live in history as the birthplace of Jose- 

 phine, the early home of Bernardin de St. Pierre and the real scene 

 (through youthful associations) of the epic of Paul and Virginia. 

 St. Pierre was, indeed, an Antillean metropolis, the abode of culture 

 and refinement, a mart of trade and shipping, the site of educational 

 institutions of no mean grade, a city whose strong and distinctive 

 characters were well worthy the gifted pen of its best chronicler, 

 Lafcadio Hearn. Up the steep slopes toward the idly gaping crater 

 four miles away, ran well beaten footpaths (for horses and wheels are 

 alien to the precipitous slopes of the Antilles) leading to plantations 

 and on to suburban villages, Carbet on the south, Precheur on the 

 northern boundary of the amphitheater, Morne Eouge on the divide 

 stretching away from the crater. The colonial Jardin Botanique lay 

 in the rear, some hundred feet above the city; luxuriant cane-fields 

 covered every available spot, groves and rows of palms skirted streets 

 and pathways, legion brooks carried living water from the upper slopes 

 to the sea, and thick native verdure mantled all the surface save fields 

 and paths. Some half-way down the trough from Pelee to St. Pierre 

 stood a minor crater, with traces of fumaroles; but they were covered 

 from sight and memory by the prevailing verdure. A picturesque 

 pond lay at the bottom of the great crater; and much of the water 

 flowing seaward from the verdure-clad hills of the trough gathered 

 into a central stream, La Eiviere Blanche. Such was the area of 

 destruction. 



It is probable that the explosion of May 5 vaporized the water of 

 the crater-set pond, and blew it into the air; it is also probable that 

 the minor crater half-way down the slope toward St. Pierre was at 

 least partially opened. More certain it is that on the morning of 

 May 8 a mass of molten rock in the throat of the great crater exploded 

 by the flashing into gas of the water and other volatile substances 

 approaching the surface and so escaping subterranean pressure; and 

 that immediately afterward (probably timed by the disturbed air 

 pressure due to the first discharge) the minor crater fired a smaller 



