256 COSMOS. 



noes the one which exhibits, every quarter of an houi, the 

 greatest quantity of fiery, widely-luminous eruptions of 

 scoriae. Instead of losing ourselves in hypotheses upon 

 the causal relations of inaccessible phenomena, we will rather 

 dwell here upon the consideration of six points of the surface 

 of the earth, which are peculiarly important and instructive 

 in the history of volcanic activity, Stromboli, the Lycian 

 Chimoera, the old volcano of JMJasaya, the very recent one 

 of Izalco, the volcano Fogo on the Cape Verd Islands, and 

 the colossal Sangay. 



The Ghimara in Lycia, and Stromboli, the ancient Stron- 

 gyle, are the two igneous manifestations of volcanic activity, 

 the historic proof of whose permanence extends the furthest 

 back. The conical hill of Stromboli, a doleritic rock, is 

 twice the height of the island of Volcano (Hiera, Thermessa), 

 the last great eruption of which occurred in the year 1775. 

 The uninterrupted activity of Stromboli is compared by 

 Strabo and Pliny with that of the island of Lipari, the 

 ancient Meligunis ; but they ascribe to " its flame," that is, 

 its erupted scorise, " a greater purity and luminosity, with 

 less heat." M The number and form of the small fiery 

 chasms are very variable. Spallanzani's description of the 

 bottom of the crater, which was long regarded as exaggerated 

 has been completely confirmed by an experienced geog- 

 nosist, Friedrich Hoffmann, and also very recently, by an 

 acute naturalist, A. de Quatrefages. One of the incandes- 

 cent chasms has an opening of only 20 feet in diameter ; it 

 resembles the pit of a blast furnace, and the ascent and 

 overflow of the fluid lava, are seen in it every hour, from a 

 position on the margin of the crater. The ancient, perma- 

 nent eruptions of Stromboli still sometimes serve for the 

 guidance of the mariner, and, as amongst the Greeks and 

 Romans, afford uncertain predictions of the weather, by 

 the observation of the direction of the flame and of the ascend. 



50 Strabo, lib. vi, p. 276, ed. Casaubon ; Pliny, Hist. Nat. iii, 9 : 

 " Strongyle, quae a Lipara liquidiore flainma tantuaa differt; e cujui 

 fumo quinam flaturi siiit venti, in triduo prsedicere incolae traduntur." 

 See also Urlichs, Vindicice Pliniance, 1853, Fasc. i, p. 39. The volcano 

 of Lipara (in the north-eastern part of the island), once so active, 

 appears to rae to have been either the Monte Campo Bianco, or the 

 Monte di Capo Castagno. (See Hoffmann, in Poggend. Annalen, Bd. xxvi, 

 *. 49--54.) 



