GEOLOGY. 601 



pomp of the east, issued from his opal bed, his forehead 

 bound with purple and gold. 1 



From this prodigious elevation, the eye embraces all the 

 circumference of Trinacria, stretching like a warm and 

 luminous cincture along the blue waves which bathe its 

 shores, its advanced promontories reminding one of the 

 three legs which symbolized Sicily on ancient medals. In 

 the distance the waves of the Ionian Sea blend with the 

 azure of heaven ; and on the other hand the mountains of 

 Calabria, with their jagged outlines, bound the panorama 

 with inexpressible magnificence, while Malta appears like a 

 dim point upon the confines of a horizon 300 leagues in cir- 

 cumference. 



Near Sicily rise from the middle of the sea the Cyclopean 

 Rocks, like so many black projections, contrasting with the 

 brilliant shore. Vestiges of the most terrible commotion of' 

 the elements, their basaltic masses, produced amid the con- 

 vulsions of the volcano, go back beyond historic epochs. 



It was on the loftiest of these rocks that the frightful 

 Polyphemus, having combed himself with a rake, delighted 

 to play upon the flute in order to charm Galatea, the fairest 

 of the Nereids. It was with the highest rock that the furi- 

 ous Cyclops crushed Acis, his favored rival. The others he 



1 [In addition to this the coloring of the crater itself is in most of these views a 

 magnificent sight. The hues include every variety of yellow, passing into the 

 purest white on one side, and deep orange or brown on the other. Occasion- 

 ally we find vermilion and other reds. " The brilliancy of these colors, "says Pro- 

 fessor Ansted, ' is such that no pencil could imitate it, and the appearance can 

 only be compared to the hues of the clouds during an autumn sunset in a warm 

 climate. These bright tints are almost entirely due to deliquescent salts of am- 

 monia, soda, and iron." TR.] 



