TRUE VOLCANOES. 361 



The smell of the smoke seemed to indicate the combustion 

 of wood and earth ; columns of vapor were indeed thought to 

 rise here and there from the ground near the shore, but the 

 naturalists who accompanied the expedition were decidedly 

 of opinion that the mysterious phenomenon could by no 

 means be ascribed to an eruption* of the high mountain, like 



* We were unable, "says D'Entrecasteaux, " to form any conjecture 

 as to the cause of the burning on the island of Amsterdam. The isl- 

 and was in flames throughout its whole extent, and we recognized 

 distinctly the smell of burned wood and earth. We had felt nothing 

 to lead us to suppose that the fire was the effect of a volcano" (t. ii., 

 p. 45). A few pages before, he says, "We remarked, however, as we 

 sailed along the coast, from which the flames were rather distant, lit- 

 tle puff's, of smoke, which seemed to come from the earth like jets ; yet 

 we could not distinguish the least trace of fire around them, though 

 we were very close to the land." These jets of smoke, which appeared 

 at intervals, were considered by the naturalists of the expedition as cer- 

 tain proofs of subterranean fire. Are we to conclude from this that 

 there were actual combustions of earth conflagrations of lignite, the 

 beds of which, covered with basalt and tufa, occur in such abundance 

 on volcanic islands (as Bourbon, Kerguelen-land, and Iceland)? The 

 Surtarbrand, on the latter island, derives its name from the Scandi- 

 navian myth of the fire-giant Stirtr causing the conflagration of the 

 world. The combustion of earth, however, causes no flame, in gen- 

 eral. As in modern times the names of the island of Amsterdam and 

 St. Paul are unfortunately often confounded on charts, I would here 

 observe, in order to prevent mistakes in ascribing to one observations 

 which apply to the other, they being very different in formation, 

 though lying almost under one and the same meridian, that originally 

 (as early as the end of the 17th century) the south island was called 

 St. Paul and the northern one Amsterdam. Vlaming, their discov- 

 erer, assigned to the first the latitude of 38 40', and to the second 

 that of 37 48' south of the equator. This corresponds in a remark- 

 able manner with the calculation made by D'Entrecasteaux a century 

 later, on the occasion of the expedition in search of La Perouse ( Voy- 

 age, t. i., p. 43-45), namely, for Amsterdam, according to Beautemps- 

 Beaupre, 37 47' 46" (long. 77 71'), for St. Paul 38 38'. This near 

 coincidence must be considered accidental, as the points of observa- 

 tion were certainly not exactly the same. On the other hand Captain 

 Blackwood, in his Admiralty chart of 1842, gives 38 44', and longi- 

 tude 77 37' for St. Paul. On the charts given in the original editions 

 of the voyages of the immortal circumnavigator Cook those, for in- 

 stance of the first and second expedition ( Voyage to the South Pole and 

 Round the World, London, 1777, p. 1), as well as of the third and last 

 voyage (Voywje to the Pacific Ocean, published by the Admiralty, Lon- 

 don, 1784, in 2d edition, 1785), and even of all the three expeditions 

 (A General Chart, exhibiting I he Discoveries of Captain Cook in his Third 

 and Tico Preceding Voyages, by Lieutenant Henry Roberts) the isl- 

 and of St. Paul is very correctly laid down as the most southernly of 

 the two; but in the text of the voyage of D'Entrecasteaux (t. i., p. 44) 

 it is mentioned, by way of censure (whether with justice or not I am 

 unable to say, although I have sought after the editions in the libraries 

 VOL. V. Q 



