VI MOUNTAINS 237 



some fissure, gradually builds itself up into 

 a cone, often of the most beautiful regularity, 

 sucb as the gigantic peaks of Chimporazo, 

 Cotopaxi (Fig. 21), and Fusiyama, and hence 

 it is that the crater is so often at, or very 

 near, the summit. 



Perhaps no spectacle in Nature is more 

 magnificent than a Volcano in activity. It 

 has been my good fortune to have stood 



Fig. 21.— Cotopaxi. 



more than once at the edge of the crater 

 of Vesuvius during an eruption, to have 

 watched the lava seething below, while enor- 

 mous stones were shot up high into the air. 

 Such a spectacle can never be forgotten. 



