ERUPTIONS OF 1902 AND THE LITERATURE 245 



mediate geologic phenomena of the volcano. The American observers, 

 notwithstanding the excellent results, were not provided with funds for 

 extended observation or equipped to stud)' the great physical and chem- 

 ical problems of the Martinique eruption.* The French commission 

 alone seems to have located on the island with a view to continuous 

 study. Observations of these parties appear from time to time in various 

 places, each containing some valuable contribution, the aggregate of 

 which is our present knowledge. 



LITERATURE 



The literature t of the Pele eruption recording the observations of these 

 many observers is extensive and excellent, although volumes could still 

 be written on the unpublished technical details and human tragedies. 

 This literature, however, notwithstanding its value, is largely a story of 

 uncorrected detail and only records the accompanying incidents of a 

 larger and more wondrous story which is the object of this paper to 

 present. 



SCOPE OF THE LARGER STORY OF PELE 



This larger story is that of the history and work of the Caribbean vol- 

 canoes as a whole, of which Pele is but a part, and the light which it 

 throws on the fundamental nature and causes of vulcanism. It is a 

 story of the world at work, as illustrated in the geologic and present 

 history of one of its areas. It is the record of the geologic evolution of 

 the Windward archipelago. 



In this larger story Pele is not treated as an accident of a day or a year, 

 but as a persistent permanent volcanic mechanism, whose action has 

 extended far back through the incomprehensible perspective of time 

 which we call geological ; nor is its work measured by the destruction 

 of a few acres of vegetation and human life, but the construction of things 

 larger — islands, oceans, continents, and perhaps even the world itself. 



In order to attempt to tell this larger story we must take up the diffi- 

 cult task of relegating the vast phenomenon of the recent eruptions to 

 its proper position as one of hundreds of similar incidents which have 

 taken place at the site of this venerable historic chimney, and of con- 



*The writer and others vainly endeavored to interest institutions with large funds for research 

 in providing for a wider and more systematic study of Pele by Americans. 



fA good bibliography of the literature by Professor I. C. Russell will be found in the 

 Smithsonian Report for 1903; also by E. O. Hovey and others in various papers. Mr Hovey's ex- 

 cellent bibliography was printed in the Bulletin of the Geological Society of America, vol 15, pp. 

 .".62-566, under the title " Bibliography of literature of the West Indian eruptions published in the 

 Tinted States." 



