THE EARTH. 



69 



and its discharge has been known to cover, for a certain space 

 around, eighty-six feet deep. In the year 1537, an eruption of 

 this mountain produced an earthquake through the whole island 

 for twelve days, overturned many houses, and at last formed a 

 new aperture, which overwhelmed all within five leagues round. 

 The cinders thrown up were driven even into Italy, and its 

 burnings were seen at Malta, at the distance of sixty leagues. 

 *' There is nothing more awful," says Kircher, " than the erup- 

 tions of this mountain, nor nothing more dangerous than attempt 

 ing to examine its appearances, even long after the eraption has 

 ceased. As v/e attempt to clamber up its steepy sides, every 

 step we take upwards, the feet sink back half way. Upon ar- 

 riving near the summit, ashes and snow, with an ill-assorted 

 conjunction, present nothing but objects of desolation. Ncr is 



ron3 of Padua, Verona, and Vicenza, a great number of extinguislied volca- 

 noes. Dalraatia lias several. It was long suspected that a district in Hungary 

 nourished subterraneous fires in its bosom ; the eruption of a volcano has 

 recently evinced the truth of the conjecture. Germany contains a great 

 number of extinguished volcanoes ; the best known of which are those 

 of Kamberg in Pohemia, Transberg near Gottingen, and those near 

 Bonn and Andernach, upon the borders of the Rhine. The Bouthcrn 

 part of France is full of extinguished volcanoes, amongst which Mount 

 Cantal, the Puy-de-Dome, and Mount d'Or in Auvergne, are the most 

 conspicuous. 



The Western is not like the Great Ocean, encircled by a chain of ignivo. 

 mous mountains, but it contains in its bosom several gronpos. If the princi- 

 pality of Wales, the island of Staffa, and some parts of Scotland and Ireland, 

 exhibit only equivocal proofs of the existence of extinguished volcanoes, 

 Iceland presents to our view its Hecla, its Kotlouguia, and several other 

 volcanoes, which rise from the mid'st of perpetual snow. This volcanic focus 

 is one of the most active in the globe ; the very bottom of the ocean is, in 

 these regions, agitated, and the waves often heave up whole fields of pumice 

 stone, or with convulsive throes give birth to permanently new islands. 

 Several circumstances lead us to suppose, that there are some volcanoes in 

 the interior of Greenland. That frozen country experiences the shocks of 

 earthquakes. The middle of the Atlantic Ocean conceals another ^'olcanic 

 focus, of which the Azores and Canary islands have felt the eflects. The 

 IVak of Teneriffe, which is 11,400 feet, is the most elevated volcano in the 

 old world. It is very probable that Lisbon has in its vicinity a submarine 

 volcano. The Antilles probably contain a whole system of volcanoes, parts 

 of wliich are recognised in Jamaica, Guadaloupe, and Grenada. We may 

 also mention some volcanoes, which are detached, or which belong to groupes 

 little known. Such are Mount Elburtz in Persia, the extinguished volcanoes 

 •if Daourie, discovered by Patriu ; perhaps some volcanoes to the north of 

 rliioa. That which is seen in Fuego, one of the Cape Verd islands, and timse 

 which the Portuguese authors point out in Guinea, Congo, and Monomotapa. 



