92 HISTORY OF 



and often emitting flames. Tiie earth, wherever we walk over 

 it, trembles beneath the feet. Noises of flames, and the hissinf* 

 of waters, are heard at the bottom. The water sometimes 

 spouts up eight or ten feet high. The most noisome fumes, 

 foetid water, and sulphureous vapours, offend the smell. A stone 

 thrown into any of the caverns, is ejected again with consider- 

 able violence. These appearances generally prevail, when the 

 sea is any way disturbed : and the whole seems to exhibit the 

 appearance of an earthquake in miniature. However, in this 

 smaller scene of wonders, as well as in the greater, there are 

 many appearances for which, perhaps, we shall never account ; 

 and many questions may be asked, which no conjectures can 

 thoroughly resolve. It was the fault of the philosophers of the 

 last age, to be more inquisitive after the causes of things than 

 after the things themselves. They seemed to think that a con- 

 fession of ignorance cancelled their claims to wisdom ; they, 

 therefore, had a solution for every demand. But the present 

 age has grown, if not more inquisitive, at least more modest ; 

 and none are now ashamed of that ignorance, which labour can 

 neither remedy nor remove. 



CHAP. XI. 



OF THE APPEARANCE. OF NEW ISLANDS AND TRACTS ; AND OF 

 THE DISAPPEARING OF OTHERS. 



Hitherto we have taken a sur\'ey only of the evils which ai'e 

 produced by subterranean fires, but we have mentioned nothing 

 of the benefits they may possibly produce. They may be of 

 use in warming and cherishing the ground, in promoting vegeta- 

 tion, and giving a more exquisite flavour to the productions of 

 the earth. The imagination of a person who has never been out 

 of our own mild region, can scarcely reach to that luxuriant 

 beauty with which all nature appears clothed in those very coun- 

 tries that we have but just now described as desolated by earth- 

 quakes, and undermined by subterranean fires. It must he 

 gi'anted, therefore, that though in those regions they have a 

 greater share in the dangers, thev have also a larger proportior 

 in the benefits of nature. 



