90 



NEWER PLIOCKNE PERIOD. 



[Ch.VII. 



here and there escaped the burning lavas, serve, by contrast, to 

 heighten the desolation of the scene. When I visited the 

 valley, nine years after the eruption of 1819, 1 saw hundreds of 

 trees, or rather the white skeletons of trees, on the borders of 

 the black lava, the trunks and branches being all leafless, and 

 deprived of their bark by the scorching heat emitted from the 

 melted rock ; an image recalling those beautiful lines 



' As when heaven's fire 



Hath scath'd the forest oaks, or mountain pines, 

 With singed top their stately growth, though bare, 

 Stands on the blasted heath.' 



Form, composition, and origin of the Dikes. But without 

 indulging the imagination any longer in descriptions of scenery, 

 we may observe, that the dikes before mentioned form unques- 

 tionably the most interesting geological phenomenon in the Val 

 del Bove. 



No. 19. 



A 



Dikes at the base of the Serre del So.fizio, Etna. 



Some of these are composed of trachyte, others 01 compact 



