TRUE VOLCANOES. 



263 



erite, but, having always been unopened, have never exhib- 

 ited any igneous activity since the time of their upheaval. 

 Eighteen are to be regarded as still active ; seven of these 

 have thrown up flames, scoriae, and lava streams in the pres- 

 ent century (1825, 1835, 1848, and 1850); and two* at the 

 end of the last century (1775 and 1799). The deficiency of 

 lava streams in the mighty volcanoes of the Cordilleras of 

 Quito has recently given occasion to the repeated assertion 

 that this deficiency is equally general in the volcanoes of 

 Central America. Certainly, in the majority of cases, erup- 

 tions of scoria? and ashes have been unaccompanied by any 

 effusion of lava — as, for example, at present in the volcano 

 of Izalco ; but the descriptions which have been given by 

 eye-witnesses of the lava-producing eruptions of the four vol- 

 canoes Nindiri, Ei Nuevo, Conseguina, and San Miguel de 

 Bosotlan give an opposite testimony.! 



I have purposely dwelt at length upon the details of the 

 position and close approximation of the linear volcanoes of 

 Central America, in the hope that some day a geognosist, 

 who has previously given a profound study to the active vol- 

 canoes of Europe and the extinct ones of Auvergne, the 

 Vivarais or the Eifel, and who also (this is of the greatest 

 importance) knows how to describe the mineralogical com- 



The great volcano of Soconusco, situated on the borders of Chiapa, 

 28 geographical miles to the south of Cuidad Real, in lat. 16° 2'. 



At the close of this long note I think I must again mention that the 

 barometric determinations of altitude here adduced are partly derived 

 from Espinache, and partly borrowed from the writings and maps of 

 Baily, Squier, and Molina. 



* The following 18 volcanoes, constituting, therefore, nearly the half 

 of all those referred to by me as active in former or present times, are 

 to be regarded as at present more or less active : Irasu and Turrialva, 

 near Cartago, El Rincon de la Vieja, Votos(?) and Orosi ; the insular 

 volcano Ometepec, Nindiri, Momotomba, El Nuevo, at the foot of the 

 trachytic mountain Las Pilas, Telica, El Viejo, Conseguina, San Mi- 

 guel Bosotlan, San Vicente, Izalco, Pacaya, Volcan de Fuego (de Gua- 

 temala), and Quesaltenango. The most, recent eruptions are those 

 of El Nuevo, near Las Pilas, on the 18th April, 1850; San Miguel 

 Bosotlan, 1848; Conseguina and San Vicente, 1835; Izalco, 1825; 

 Volcan de Fuego, near New Guatemala, 1799 and 1852 ; and Pacaya, 

 1775. 



f Compare Squier, Nicaragua, vol. ii., p. 103, with p. 10G and 111, 

 as also his previous small work On the Volcanoes of Central America, 

 1850, p. 7; Leopold de Buch, lies Canaries, p. 506, where reference 

 is made to the lava stream which broke out of the volcano Nindiri in 

 1775, and which has been recently again seen by a very scientific ob- 

 server, Dr. Oersted. 



