ON ITS EXTERIOR. VOLCANOES. 255 



(which furnishes a dye-stuff), from the face of precipitous 

 cliffs, suspending themselves for that purpose by ropes 

 overhanging the sea. For some months various contri- 

 vances were tried with a crane and pulley for supporting 

 a long beam over the abyss. The Dominican, with his 

 head covered with an iron helmet, and a crucifix in his 

 hand, and three other members of the association were 

 let down, and remained for a whole night on a part of 

 the solid crater floor, from whence they made vain 

 attempts to fill earthen vessels, lowered in an iron 

 caldron, with the supposed liquid gold. In order not 

 to discourage the shareholders ( 378 ), they agreed to say, 

 when they were drawn up, that they had found great 

 riches ; and that " el Infierno de Masaya " would 

 henceforth deserve to be called " el Paraiso de Masaya." 

 The operation was subsequently repeated several times, 

 until the governador of the neighbouring city of Gra- 

 nada, either suspecting the deceit or that the royal 

 revenue would be defrauded, forbade " persons being let 

 down by ropes into the crater." This was in the summer 

 of 1538; but in 1551, Juan Alvarez, Dean of the 

 Chapter of Leon, received from Madrid the very 

 naive permission "to open the volcano and take out 

 the gold contained in it." Such were the popular 

 beliefs in the 1 6th century ; and even in our own times, 

 in 1822, it was necessary that Monticelli and Covelli, at 

 Naples, should demonstrate by chemical experiments 

 that the ashes of Vesuvius, from the eruption of 

 the 28th of December, did not contain any gold ! ( 379 ) 



The volcano of Izalco, which is situated 'on the 

 west coast of Central America, thirty-two miles north 

 of San Salvador, and east of the harbour of Sonso- 



