120 M. de Humboldt o« the Volccmos of Guatemala. 



Apaneca or Zonzonate, Pacaya, the Volcano de Agiia, the two 

 volcanos de Fuego or Guatemala, Acatenango,Toliraan, Atitlan, 

 Tajamulco, Sunil, Suchiltepegues, Sopotitlan, the Hamilpas 

 (properl V two contiguous volcanos of this name), and Soconusco. 

 Of these twenty burning mountains, those of San Miguel, San 

 Vincente, Isalco, San Salvador, Pacaya, theVolcanode Fuego 

 or de Guatemala, Atitlan, and the Volcano de Sapotitlan, have 

 hitherto been the most active. The volcano of Isalco had 

 great eruptions in April 1798, and from 1805 to 1807, when 

 the flames often came in sight. It is particularly rich in am- 

 monium *. 



The volcano of Pacaya lies three miles from the village of 

 Amatitlan, and consequently east of the Volcano de Agua. 

 It is not so isolated as the latter, but is prolonged into a vast 

 ridge with three apparent summits. Streams of lava (which 

 the inhabitants here as well as in Mexico call desert-land 

 (?nal pai/s), pumice, scoriae and sand, have laid waste the sur- 

 rounding country. At the end of the sixteendi century (ac- 

 cording to the Cronista Fuentes, tom. i. liv. 9. cap. 9.) the 

 Pacaya emitted day and night not only smoke but flames. 

 The greatest and most celebrated eruptions of the volcano oi' 

 Pacaya were those of 1565, 1651, 1664, 1668, 1671, 1677, 

 and of the 11th of July 1775. The last eruption was not 

 from the summit itself, but from one of the three lower lateral 

 peaks. 



The Volcan de Fuego, or as it is also called Volcan de 

 Guatemala, is situated five miles west of the water-volcano 

 and two miles south-west of the city of Antigua Guatemala. 

 It still at times evolves flame and smoke. Its greatest erup- 

 tions since the arrival of the Spaniards were in 1581, 1586, 

 1623, 1705, 1710, 1717, 1732, and 1737. It is in the shape of 

 a beautiful cone, near its top, however, disfigured by several 

 hills of scoria;, the remains of lateral eruptions. 



The order of succession in which the extinguished volcanos 

 arise south of Laguna de Atitlan, between Nueva Guatemala 

 and Zapotitlan, seems to me, as a fact in geological science, very 

 remarkable. They stand on two chasms east and west, and 

 look as if they had slidden ; so that the more western row lies 



* We believe that the theory of volcanos held by M. de Humboldt, is ;i 

 modification of that proposed by Sir H. D:ivy, in which the phaenoiiiena 

 they present are ascribed to the decomposition of water by the metallic 

 bases of the earths and alkalies existing in the earth. We presume, there- 

 fore, that when he states the volcano here mentioned to be rich in am- 

 monium, it is to be understood that it evolves a hwgc quantity of muriate 

 of ammonia, from which circumstance M. dc Munibolclt infers that (inmnt- 

 nium, the supposed metallic base oi ammonia, is abundant in its interior. 



E.W.B. 



