32 Remarkable Phenomenon of Sound 



vibrating motion of the air should have been propagated to 

 such a distance as we find in the case before us, exceeds, I 

 believe, every instance of the kind, and has not a parallel in 

 history. 



Soon after these occurrences, we received information from 

 Barbadoes, that the whole of that island had been visited, on 

 the 1st of May, not merely by a nocturnal darkness, but by 

 a complete and total darkness, which continued from about 

 the hour of eight, a.m., till twelve at noon, and was attended 

 by a continued shower or fall of fine sand, which completely 

 covered the surface of the island. This wonderful pheno- 

 menon, as might well be expected, excited the astonishment 

 of all, and threw the inhabitants into the utmost consternation. 

 The cause being unknown, they considered it an express visi- 

 tation or warning from the Deity. It was also stated, but in a 

 vague and indefinite manner, that, in the night preceding the 

 phenomenon, some reports were heard like cannon, and flashes 

 of lightning were seen. 



The next arrival brought intelligence that, at two or three 

 o'clock in the morning of the 1st of May, the mountain 

 SoufFre, in the island of St. Vincents, had burst forth with the 

 most tremendous explosion, surpassing that of the heaviest 

 artillery, throwing up immense volumes of thick dense smoke, 

 and livid flames, ejecting red-hot rocks of enormous weight to 

 a prodigious elevation in the air, while rivers, as it were, of 

 ignited minerals rolled down the sides of the mountain. The 

 whole surface of the island had been covered with volcanic 

 ashes, sand, and vitrified earths, the more ponderous sub- 

 stances naturally falling more adjacent to the mountain. Pro- 

 visions and all vegetation had been destroyed, and the inha- 

 bitants reduced to a state of starvation. 



The cinders were, on this occasion, thrown around to vast 

 distances. I have a sample which was taken on the 13th 

 from the deck of a vessel 150 miles to the windward of Bar- 

 badoes. This may seem incredible ; but it is well known that 

 the same phenomenon was witnessed on board many other 

 vessels. History furnishes only an instance of the cinders of 

 Mount Etna having been thrown upon the African coast. 



It must have been owing to a continuous and inconceivable 



