188 COSMOS. 



quest, in the very year before his death, with theoretical in- 

 vestigations upon the question, how in the elevation of 

 mountains and alterations in the surface of the earth, the 

 isothermal surfaces are brought into equilibrium with the 

 new form of the soil. The lateral radiation from strata 

 which lie in the same level, but are differently covered, 

 plays in this case a more important part than the direction 

 (inclination) of the cleavage planes of the rock, in cases 

 where stratification is observable. 



I have already elsewhere^mentioned* how the hot springs 

 in the environs of ancient Carthage, probably the thermal 

 springs of Pertusa (aquce calidce of Hammam-el-Enf ), led 

 Bishop Patricius, the martyr, to the correct view of the 

 cause of the higher or lower temperature of the bubbling 

 waters. When the Proconsul Julius tried to confuse the 

 accused bishop by the mocking question, " Quo auctore fer- 

 vens hcec aqua tantum ebulliatf Patricius set forth his the- 

 ory of the central heat, " which causes the fiery eruptions of 

 JEtna and Vesuvius, and communicates more and more heat 



* With regard to this passage, discovered by Bureau de la Malle, 

 see Cosmos, vol. i., p. 223, 224. "Est autem," says Saint Patricius, 

 " et supra firmamentum caeli, et subter terrain ignis atque aqua ; et 

 qua? supra terram est aqua, coacta in unum, appellationera marium : 

 qua? vero infra, abyssorum suscepit; ex quibus ad generis humani 

 usus in terram velut siphones quidam emittuntur et scaturiunt. Ex 

 iisdera quoque et thernue exsistunt : quarum quse ab igne absunt 

 longius, provida boni Dei erga nos mente, frigidiores ; qua} vero pro- 

 pius a,&mod\im,ferventes fluunt. In quibusdam etiam locis et tepidse 

 aquas reperiuntur, pro ut majore ab igne intervallo sunt disjunctse." 

 So run the words in the collection : Ada Primorum Martyrwn, opera 

 et studio Theodorici Ruinart, ed. 2, Amstela}dami, 1713 fol., p. 555. 

 According to another report (A. S. Mazochii, in veins marmoreum 

 sanctce Neapolitans Ecclesice, Kalendarium commentarius, vol. ii., Neap. 

 1744, 4to, p. 385), Saint Patricius developed nearly the same theory 

 of telluric heat before the Proconsul Julius ; but at the conclusion of 

 his speech the cold hell is more distinctly indicated : "Nam quae lon- 

 gius ab igne subterraneo absunt, Dei optimi providentia frigidiores 

 erumpunt. At qua} propiores igni sunt, ab eo fervefacta}, intolerabili 

 calore prasditas promuntur foras. Sunt et alicubi tepida}, quippe non 

 parum sed longiuscule ab eo igne remotaB. Atque ille infernus ignis 

 impiarum est animarum carnificina ; non secus ac subterraneus frigi- 

 dissimus gurges, in glaciei glebas concretus, qui Tartarus mmcupatur." 

 The Arabic name, Hammam-el-Enf, signifies nose-baths, and is, as Tem- 

 ple has already remarked, derived from the form of a neighboring 

 promontory, and not from a favorable action exerted by this thermal 

 water upon diseases of the nose. The Arabic name has been various- 

 ly altered by reporters : Hammam 1'Enf or Lif, Emmamelif (Peys- 

 sonel), la Mamelif (Desfontaines). See Gumprecht, Die Mineralguel- 

 len aufdem Fcstlande von Africa (1851), s. 140-144. 



