Nov. 8, 1883] 



NA TURE 



3' 



half an hour. An apparently ilhmitable cloud of drifting 

 pumice was encountered at a distance of ten miles from 

 the island, and twenty miles farther a fecond cloud of 

 pumice, which was so thick that a bucket let down into 

 the sea was filled with it before it reached the surface of 

 the water, while the ship, although going at the rate of 

 I OS knots an hour, cut through the pumice with a noise 

 like that made by a vessel breaking way through thin ice. 



A short time afterwards a visit was made to the scene 

 of the eruption by a party from Batavia, and as the 

 account of this visit contains perhaps the latest descrip- 

 tion of the condition of Krakatoa before the great convul- 

 sion of August 26, a few words from it may be perhaps 

 not devoid of interest. 



The spectacle as seen from the north of Krakatoa was 

 one calculated to have inspired the pencil of a Dore. 

 From the devastated island a huge, broad pillar of smoke 

 towered upwards as high as the clouds ; and while Ver- 

 laten Island gladdened the eye with its profuse display of 

 the glories of tropical vegetation, Long Island was com- 

 pletely withered up, — the leafless trees, bent, twisted, and 

 torn, but not scorched, were left standing like naked 

 spectres, as colourless as the soil, or rather enveloped in 

 the same neutral tint of gray, from the pumice dust, as 

 all the rest of the island. Between these two, and only 

 separated from each by a narrow channel, rose, somewhat 

 in the background, the lofty cone of Krakatoa, still 

 covered with green foliage, and without any signs of 

 activity. But in front of the volcano all was wrecked, 

 covered, nay, completely buried, under pumice dust, 

 which, when the sun shone upon it, became of a yel- 

 lowish-gray colour, while thick masses of condensed 

 vapour, accompanied by incessant fulminations, boiled 

 up from behind the bare and gently sloping dunes. 

 These masses of vapour were for the most part snowy 

 white, others gray, and were closely intertwined, afterwards 

 spreading out in continually widening circles. It was as 

 if a gigantic spectral cauliflower were with incredible 

 rapidity evolving its successive stages of growth before 

 the spectator' s eyes. The volumes of vapour were shot 

 out with terrific force in a strictly vertical direction ; the 

 atmospheric pressure in the middle of them must have 

 been something fearful. And from time to time immense 

 funnels became visible, leading outwards, and into these 

 many of the incessantly changing ravelled wreaths of 

 smoke were sucked. The rest maintained their original 

 form to a height of several thousand feet ; then they 

 slowly drifted eastwards, and, spreading out into mist, 

 discharged their ashes downwards in black streaks like the 

 dark fringes of rain-clouds seen on the horizon. Occa- 

 sionally the bellowings became louder, and a thicker and 

 larger volume of sinoke was vomited forth. Soon after- 

 wards it was noticed that the sky in the west, which was 

 there as bright and clear as it was dark and heavy in the 

 opposite quarter, was being thronged with small, dark 

 bodies, — they were pieces of pumice, of no great gravity, 

 hovering in the air as if upheld by the power of the fiery 

 breath that was streaming upwards. On landing, the 

 party found that they sank up to the ankles in ashes, and 

 accordingly it was necessary to proceed with great cau- 

 tion. As they slowly ascended, the ground and the air 

 both became warmer, the evidences of destruction amongst 

 the trees more conspicuous, and pieces of pumice lay 

 scattered more thickly on the ground. Arrived at a height 

 of about 200 feet above sea level, they found themselves 

 on the edge of a " caldron " of about 700 yards in diame- 

 ter, probably a former crater. Thence they saw to the 

 north-east the seat of the recent outbreak of May 20, the 

 maximum length of which was about 100 to no yards. 

 Here, besides the volumes of vapour and smoke and pumice 

 dust, they also observed sulphur troughs, out of which 

 the mud boiled up in enormous bubbles, which at length 

 burst ; and sulphur springs and new but smaller columns 

 of smoke showed themselves in other places. The noise 



was terrible ; the sound made by the discharge of a rifle 

 was like the snapping of a bonbon in the midst of the 

 hilarity of a banqueting hall. Some of the party ven- 

 tured to descend a little way into the crater, a few even 

 to step tentatively upon its hot and burning floor. They 

 brought back with them pieces of pumice and lava ' — a 

 kind of black glass — or a piece of sulphur as a memento 

 of the visit. By the time they reached the steamer again 

 darkness had come on, and the spectacle was then one of 

 extraordinary beauty and grandeur. The great column 

 of smoke was still tolerably visible, but the lower part 

 had become a mass of glowing red, from which tongues 

 of yellow flame continued to dart incessantly. At inter- 

 vals a shower of fine sparks broke out from the cloud, and 

 red-hot stones clove fiery furrows in the air, and fell back 

 at an acute angle to the earth, where they were shat- 

 tered into a thousand pieces. 



That the activity of the mountain was continued during 

 the months of June and July is certain from the report of 

 the Comptroller of Katimbang (on the easternmost pro- 

 montory of Sumatra), who observed several violent deto- 

 nations. Also from other places in Sumatra, and 

 particularly from Mexapi (100" 28' E. long., 0° 20' S. lat.), 

 came tidings of volcanic movements ; and similar reports 

 arrived from Java. 



Then cam.- the outbreak of August 26, surprising, in- 

 conceivable, in its terrible eftects. Although full and 

 detailed reports are not yet to hand, as indeed from the 

 nature of the circumstances they cannot well be expected 

 to be, for communications are in great measure inter- 

 rupted, destroyed, and rendered impossible, or those who 

 should have made the reports have either fallen victims 

 to the catastrophe, or have fled — who knows where ? — yet 

 sufficient intelligence has reached us to justify an estimate 

 of the number of the victims who have perished at tens of 

 thousands ; and as for the amount and extent of the 

 material damage done, it is so great that an approximate 

 calculation even cannot be attempted. 



The plain simple facts to which all this is due were the 

 eruption of .-Vugust 26, and particularly the ocean wave 

 which succeeded it on the following day.'- This destruc- 

 tive wave appears to have started from Krakatoa, or its 

 neighbourhood, as a centre, to have dashed with terrific 

 force upon the contiguous coasts of Java and Sumatra, to 

 have proceeded down the Sunda Straits eastwards with a 

 height that reached from 40 to loo feet in the narrow 

 throat of the pass opposite Anjer, and 17 feet at Batavia, 

 and even to have extended to the western and eastern 

 shores of America, where it was observed on the 27th and 

 29th respectively. Not to repeat what has been already 

 stated in this journal (vol. xxviii. p. 443), it will be suffi- 

 cient to add that a few days after the occurrence we learnt 

 in Europe from official telegrams that Tjiringin, Anjer, 

 and the quarries of Merak, as well as the cone of Krakatoa, 

 had disappeared from sight. But further intelligence from 

 Java, of August 28, states that Krakatoa has not entirely 

 disappeared. 



Although information respecting the extent of damage 

 and destruction caused on the south coast of Sumatra is 

 still very meagre, it appears that the two bays of Lampong 

 and Semangka have been rendered totally unfit for 

 navigation owing to the immense masses of floating 

 pumice with which they are covered. In Lampong Bay, 

 notwithstanding that it was protected by certain islands, 

 the momentum w^as so great that at Telok Betong a 

 Government steamer was carried three miles inland. 

 Telok Betong itself, the chief town of the Royal Lam- 

 pong District, is, with the exception of the resident's 

 house, the fort, and the prison, completely destroyed. 



' This deserves particular notice. Herr Met2ger ascended several cf the 

 volcanoes of Java, and often stayed days and weeks together upon them 

 and in their immediate vicinity without ever once finding what was, strictly 

 speaking, lava. . ■ . v 



- It is now stated that waves, but of no extraordinary height, were ob- 

 served at 6 p.m. on August 26. 



