

chap, xix.] THE VOLCANO. 451 



sulphureous smoke for ever issues from this bare and deso- 

 late peak ? Whence the mighty forces that produced that 

 peak, and still from time to time exhibit themselves in the 

 earthquakes that always occur in the vicinity of volcanic 

 vents? The knowledge from childhood, of the fact that 

 volcanoes and earthquakes exist, has taken away somewhat 

 of the strange and exceptional character that really belongs 

 to them. The inhabitant of most parts of northern Europe, 

 sees in the earth the emblem of stability and repose. His 

 whole life-experience, and that of all his age and genera- 

 tion, teaches him that the earth is solid and firm, that its 

 massive rocks may contain water in abundance but never 

 fire ; and these essential characteristics of the earth are 

 manifest in every mountain his country contains. A 

 volcano is a fact opposed to all this mass of experience, a 

 fact of so awful a character that, if it were the rule instead 

 of the exception, it would make the earth uninhabitable; 

 a fact so strange and unaccountable that we may be sure 

 it woidd not be believed on any human testimony, if pre- 

 sented to us now for the first time, as a natural phenomenon 

 happening in a distant country. 



The summit of the small island is composed of a highly 

 crystalline basalt; lower down I found a hard stratified 

 slaty sandstone, while on the beach are huge blocks of lava, 

 and scattered masses of white coralline limestone. The 

 larger island has coral rock to a height of three or four 



G G 2 



