114 S. SEKIYA AND Y. KIKÜCHI 



The explosions were accompanied by terrible wind blasts, or coups 



de veut. In the parts most exposed to the fury of these blasts, 

 houses were levelled to the ground and trees torn up by their roots. 

 Everywhere, however, as might be expected, the fall was in a direction 

 radially away from the forces of explosion, which was also the origin 

 of these destructive and fearful gusts. In PL XV the area swept by 

 the windblasts is shown by arrows, their heads pointing in the direc- 

 tions in which the trees and other objects fell. It was curious to see 

 the manner in which one particular field of growing rice, on the 

 southeast of the volcano, had been thus levelled by the wind. The 

 slender stalks were laid flat upon the ground as evenly and regularly 

 as if they had been combed down in parallel lines. Not a stalk lay 

 across its neighbours. The heads of rice in one furrow covered the 

 roots in the next furrow, and the entire field looked like the warp of 

 some huge loom ready for the weaver's hands. 



It would appear that the tremendous explosions of steam at 

 quick intervals, lasting for about a minute, produced violent distur- 

 bances of the air, consequent upon the sudden radial expansion of the 

 liberated volumes of steam. When a large piece of ordnance is tired 

 grasses, shrubs and objects in the vicinity are overthrown by the 

 sudden expansion of the gaseous products escaping at the muzzle, 

 which, displacing the air, imparts to it a forward impulse and violent 

 vibratory motion. The eruption of Bandai-san may be aptly com- 

 pared to the tiring of a tremendous gun — such an one, however, as 

 can only be forged by Nature. 



Places screened by hills and mountain sides escaped. Maru- 

 mori-yama, situated near the mouth of the crater, and fully exposed, 

 received the severest damage. This hill, which was formerly covered 

 with a thick forest, now presents a most melancholy appearance, the 

 few trees left standing being as naked as telegraphic poles. The 



