510 



ENCLOSING OF FOSSILS IN PEAT, ETC. 



[Ch. XLIV. 



Hercnlanean 



may- 



tuffs containing' the rolls of papyrus^ of 

 which, the characters are still legible, have, as was before 

 remarked, been for ages covered by lava. 



Another mode by which lava may tend to the conservation 

 of imbedded remains, at least of works of human art, is by its 

 overflowing them when it is not intensely heated, in which 

 case they sometimes suffer little or no injury. 



Thus when the Etnean lava-current of 1669 covered four- 

 teen towns and villages, and part of the city of Catania, it did 

 not melt down a great number of statues and other articles 



m 



in the vaults of Catania; and at the depth of 35 feet in 

 the same current, on the site of Mompiliere, one of the buried 

 towns, the bell of a church and some statues were found 

 uninjured (p. 24). 



i 



