THE GllEAT ERUPTION OF SAKUllA-JIMA IN 1914. 



71 



Jan. 13th, 



MOKNING 



The nuke 



ARDENTE 



From midnight to 1 (?4) a.m. of the 13th, smoke- 

 clouds were in full force and the explosive activity at- 

 tained its climax enforced with detonations, air-concussions and 

 discharges of electricity, throwing out heated ruptured blocks. 

 During these hours a local hurricane raged, caused by a 

 downward current, uprooting trees and wrecking houses 

 on the western shore. It was a dark and heavy, scorching and 

 expanding steam-cloud, laden with éjecta of preexisting rocks of 

 varying dimensions, which apparently crept down the slope west- 

 wards like the fiery wind of Mt. Pelée. {See Frontispiece and 

 Text-fig. 15.) No one has ever described the scene, as the people 



Fig. 18«. — Prosperous villages of the western slope, looking down from the North cone — the 

 theater of the recent eruption and devastation on the west side. (Photo by Mr. Uyéda.) 



had already deserted this portion of the island. The marks left 

 by the scorching blast are the bare trunks of trees and the thick 

 deposits of blocks of various sizes, thinly mixed with ash, the 

 latter being the characteristic volcanic conglomerate 

 (PL V. Fig. 2) — the work of the nuée ardente^ which every one 



