THE GIŒAT ERUrTIOX OF SAKUILV-JIMA IN 1914. 



81 



island owing to the advance of the encroaching lava (1^1. Yl. Fig. 

 3), the temperature of the water at its proximity being 37^ to 

 40° C. It was said that on the east the lava had drowned Arimura, 

 leaving 300 m. of its western portion lava-free, and the front was 

 abeady under the sea, boiling the water w^hich was escaping in 

 salt fumes. The Séto branch of the Xabé-yama lava stream now 

 advanced further seawards, and at 3 p.^l, the Séto Channel was 

 reduced to only 18 m. in breadth. 

 Pumice Remarkable scenery was met with in Kagoshima 



OF Sea Bay, which was turned into an extensive biiß desert of 



pumice, which fell on the 12th (p. 68 and footnote), covering land 

 and water all alike, and the boundary could only be detected by 

 probing. Where the pumice was very thick, people said it could 

 be walked^^ on for a short distance. Boats could not, of course. 



Fig. 21. — Floating pumice desert on the western shore of Saknra-jima. 



1) The very same thing hajipened during the An-ei eruption (1779), when thick j)umice 

 choked the narrow- channel of Séto. Two terror-stricken peoijle crossed on foot to Osumi, while 

 the third sTxnk to the bottom to be seen no more, as the strong floating sheet of pumice did 

 not allow him t^ emerge from it. See p. 47. The fishes, on the contrary, broke through and 

 were leajjing about on the pumice sheet. As they could not plunge again into the water, people 

 were picking them easily with hand near the quay of Kagoshima, 



