Biographical Memoir of the late Friedrich Hoffmann. 11 



penetrating, during his journey southwards, into the Abruzzi. 

 This tour rewarded him amply, but was unfavourable for the 

 object he had in view, which was to arrive in the volcanic dis- 

 trict at a good season ; and it was not till August, the tenth 

 month after his departure from Berlin, that he arrived in 

 Naples. Well aware how far Etna surpassed Vesuvius in phe- 

 nomena connected with his special object, he confined himself 

 for the present to a cursory general view of the volcanic neigh- 

 bourhood of Naples, and hastened onwards, in order to arrive 

 at Catania ere it should be too late to ascend Etna. He there- 

 fore embarked, in the month of September, with three compa- 

 nions, at Naples for Messina ; and he employed the remainder 

 of the year 1830, in the first instance, in investigating the 

 coast between Messina and Catania ; and then, in ascending 

 repeatedly Mount Etna, in traversing the wide extent of its 

 declivities in all directions^ in investigating, by dint of prodi- 

 gious exertions, the most impassable ravines and inaccessible pre- 

 cipices, so that he might obtain a satisfactory knowledge of the 

 peculiar features of this remarkable mountain, whose accumula- 

 tions of ejected matter, formed during early single eruptions, 

 sometimes surpass in extent the whole of Vesuvius. From 

 Christmas till the middle of February 1831, violent torrents of 

 rain prevented the continuance of his expeditions from Catania ; 

 but this leisure was necessary, in order to arrange his great 

 mass of observations, and to dispatch the collections which he had 

 accumulated. When the weather improved, he commenced the 

 construction of a geognostical map of Sicily in its whole extent ; 

 and this great work, which was carried on with inexhaustible 

 care and perseverance, occupied a period of more than ten 

 months. Catania, and still more Palermo, served as resting 

 points for the arrangement of his observations and collections. 

 Hoffmann enjoved also here the valuable assistance of distin- 

 guished patrons and well-wishers. A remarkable interruption 

 to these extensive labours was caused by the unexpected break- 

 ing forth of a new volcano, which, at the beginning of July 

 1831, was raised up from the bottom of the sea, at a distance 

 of a little more than five miles from the south-west coast of 

 Sicily. Its erupted matter formed a hill of loosely heaped-up 

 small fragments of slag, ashes, and sand, and which had a dia- 



