t 

 )f 



a 



ca. xxiil] 



OF VOLCANIC EEGIONS. 



589 



southerly direction. The line is then continued to the south- 



Nip 



Loo 



principal of the Japanese group. It then extends by 

 Choo and Formosa to the Philippine Islands, and thence by 

 Sanffir and the north-eastern extremity of Celebes to the 

 Moluccas (see map, fig. 59). Afterwards it passes westward 

 through Sumbawa to Java. 



There are said to be thirty-eight considerable volcanos in 

 Java some of which are more than 10,000 feet high. They 

 are remarkable for the quantity of sulphur and sulphureous 



vapours which they discharge 



emit 



from them, like the moya 



Quito. The memorable eruption of Galongoon, in 1822, will be 

 described in the twenty-sixth chapter. The crater of Taschem, 



y of Java, contains a lake strongly 



emi 



mile 



from which a river of acid water issues, which supports no 

 living creature, nor can fish live in the sea near its confluence. 

 There is an extinct crater near Batur, called Guevo Upas, or 

 the Valley of Poison, about half a mile in circumference, 

 which is justly an object of terror to the inhabitants of the 

 country. Every living being which penetrates into this valley 

 falls down dead, and the soil is covered with the carcasses 

 of tigers, deer, birds, and even the bones of men ; all killed 

 by the abundant emanations of carbonic acid gas, by which 

 the bottom of the valley is filled. 



In another crater in this land of wonders, near the volcano 

 of Talaga Bodas, we learn from Mr. Eeinwardt, that the 

 sulphureous exhalations have killed tigers, birds, and innu- 

 merable insects ; and the soft parts of these animals, such as 

 fibres, muscles, nails, hair, and skin, are very well preserved, 

 while the bones are corroded, and entirely destroyed. 



We learn from observations made in 1844, by Mr. Jukes, 

 that a recent tertiary formation composed of limestone and 

 resembling the coral rock of a fringing reef, clings to the 

 flanks of all the volcanic islands from the east end of Timor 

 to the west end of Java. These modern calcareous strata 

 are often white and chalk-like, sometimes 1,000 feet and up- 

 wards above the sea, regularly stratified in thick horizontal 



