346 BfUs deprived of their "torn. [Book VI. 



Ihe iaid was very comfortable ; and though now ap- 

 prized of their danger, they were ftill very unwilling 

 to leave the convent, in which they had been fhut up 

 almoft from their infancy, their ideas being as limited 

 as the fpace they inhabited. Having been defired to 

 pack up whatever they had that was moft valuable, 

 rhey all loaded themfelves with bifcuits and fweet- 

 meats, and it was but by accident it was difcovered 

 that they had left a fum of money behind them, which 

 was recovered for them. 



The lava pafied over the center and beft part of 

 the town j no part of the cathedral remained above 

 it, except the upper part of a fquare brick tower, in 

 which were the bells ; and it is a curious circumftance, 

 that thole bells, although they were neither cracked 

 nor melted, were deprived of their tone as much as if 

 they had been cracked. When the lava firft entered 

 the fea it threw up the water to a prodigious height ; 

 and particularly when two points of lava met and in- 

 clofed a pool of water, that water was thrown np with 

 great violence, and a loud report : at this time, as well 

 as the day after alfo, a great many boiled fifn were feen 

 floating on the fur face of the fea. 



The lava over the cathedra!, and in other parts of 

 the town, is faid to be upwards of forty feet in thick- 

 rrefs; the general height of the lava during its whole 

 courfe was about twelve feet, and in fome parts not 

 lefs than a mile in breadth. 



When Sir William Hamilton vificcd it on the lyth 

 of June, the tops of the houfes were juft vifible here 

 and there in fbme parts, and the timbers within ftill 

 burning caufed a bright flame to iffue out of the fur- 

 face 3 in other parts, the fulphur and falts exhaled in a 

 white fmoke from the lava, forming a white or yellow 

 cruft on the fcorix round the fpots where it iffued with 



tke 



