SABRINA. 



hundred and thirty fathoms deep, at little more 

 than one-twelfth part of a mile, if we suppose the 

 slope uniform. The rapidity of the slope, and the 

 depth of the sounding are not very consistent with 

 the supposition that a shoal in any way tended to 

 the formation of the island, though it is true, that 

 with the same external action, the bottom would 

 rise more readily in shallow water than in deep. 



The island was subsequently visited by various 

 persons, and the nature of its materials examined. 

 Ashes, a substance resembling cake, scoria of iron, 

 and burnt clay, were the chief ones ; and there 

 were not many of the substances that are usually 

 discharged in the eruption of volcanoes. It should 

 seem that only the common matters at the bottom 

 of the sea came to the surface, even when the walls 

 of the crater attained an elevation of nearly two 

 hundred feet ; for the layers formed by the suc- 

 cessive eruptions, which could easily be distin- 

 guished by the salt that was left when they evapo- 

 rated the water, were friable and yielding to the 

 action of the waves. 



It seems to be not an unusual occurrence, in 

 what may be called volcanic seas, for small islands 

 to rise up in that manner, and afterwards to dis- 

 appear, probably by the mere action of the water. 

 That was the case with the island of Sabrina, 

 which made its appearance off the Azores in 1811, 

 and attained nearly the same dimensions as the 

 one in question. It has now disappeared and 

 there are eighty fathoms of water in the place 

 where it stood. As those instances are well au- 

 thenticated, and as others have been mentioned, 

 it is by no means unlikely that they occur fre- 

 quently in the sea without producing any appear- 



