92 



NEWER PLIOCENE PERIOD. 



[Ch. VII. 



cones, or, in other words, the channels which gave passage to 

 the lava-currents and scoriae that have issued from vents in the 

 forest-zone. 



Some fissures may have been filled from above, but I did 

 not see any which, by terminating downwards, gave proof of 

 such an origin. Almost all the isolated masses in the Val del 

 Bove, such as Capra, Musara, and others, are traversed by 

 dikes, and may, perhaps, have partly owed their preservation 

 to that circumstance, if at least the action of occasional floods 

 has been one of the destroying causes in the Val del Bove ; for 

 there is nothing which affords so much protection to a mass of 

 strata against the undermining action of running water, as a 

 perpendicular dike of hard rock. 



In the accompanying drawing (No. 21) the flowing of the 



No. 21. 



Fiew of the rocks Finochio, Capra, and Musara, Fal del Bove. 



lavas of 1811 and 1819, between the rocks Finochio, Capra, and 

 Musara, is represented. The height of the two last-mentioned 

 isolated masses has been much diminished by the elevation of 

 their base, caused by these currents. They may, perhaps, be 

 the remnants of cones, which existed before the Val del Bove 

 was formed, and may hereafter be once more buried by the 

 lavas that are now accumulating in the valley. 



