636 



Volcanoes, 



tation, some persons have endeavoured to calculate the re- 

 lative ages of the cones ; but these opinions are exceedingly 

 vague, as it requires a longer period to form a soil on some 

 lavas than on others [see p. 527.]- The earliest historical notice 

 v^e have of this mountain is by Thucydides, who states that 

 there were three eruptions previous to the Peloponnesian war 

 {^Sl B. c.)j to one of which Pindar alludes in his first Pythian 

 Ode. In the year 396 b. c. the volcano was again active ; 

 and according to Diodorus Siculus, the Carthaginian army 

 was stopped in its march against Syracuse by the flowing 

 lava. But let it suffice, to say that ten eruptions previous to, 

 and forty-eight subsequent to, the Christian era, have been 

 recorded ; some when the mountain was in the phase of 

 moderate activity, and others when in the phase of prolonged 

 intermittence. 



From the Island of Sicily we pass on to the Grecian Archi- 

 pelago, which has at various times been the seat of violent 

 volcanic action ; but we have already described the formation 

 of Santorino and its adjacent islands. The epoch of the 

 eruptions in Milo are unknown, but they are evidently recent ; 

 and we may therefore class it among the active volcanoes. It 

 abounds in hot springs, and other demonstrations of a present 

 activity. 



Iceland is an island peculiarly subject to the devastating 

 effects of volcanoes : indeed, we may mention it as more re- 

 markable than all others, both for the number of its cones, 

 and their habitual activity. Hecla (Jig, 113.), the most cele- 



brated volcano of this island, has suffered thirteen eruptions 

 since the year 1137 ; and during the last eight hundred years 

 there have been twenty- two. After the eruption of 1766, It 



