264 The National Geographic Magazine 



miles in three minutes, and was wit- 

 nessed by the people of the Indefatigable 

 and the Potomac. Mr Richard Kalisch, 

 an eyewitness, showed me photographs 

 of this cloud from which I made a sketch. 



The most serious recurrence of erup- 

 tion was on the afternoon of May 20, 

 about 5.15 a. m. A cloud floated over 

 Fort de France and caused an exodus 

 of the people from that city. This erup- 

 tion of Monday, according to Engineer 

 Evans, who was in the hospital at Fort 

 de France, lasted until daylight, and was 

 accompanied by many detonations. 

 Showers of stone the size of a hen's egg 

 fell upon the hospital. The falling 

 sounded like hail, and tore the leaves 

 from the trees. These stones, as I as- 

 certained by personal collection the fol- 

 lowing day, were old crystalline rock 

 of the mountain and not pumice. 



Victor stated that this eruption of 

 Ma} r 20 was accompanied by total dark- 

 ness over his point of view, Deux Choux, 

 after a great explosion of flame, one- 

 half of which went up to heaven and 

 the other half toward St Pierre, just 

 as the clock was striking 5 a. m. Lieu- 

 tenant Gilmore, executive officer of the 

 Cincinnati, who is so well known to the 

 American people by his experience as a 

 prisoner among the Filipinos, saw the 

 cloud which rolled over Fort de France. 

 He states that the stones which fell on 

 the deck of the Cincinnati were so hot 

 that they burned the awnings on the 

 cutter. These came down like hail. 

 Lieutenant McCormack, of the Potomac, 

 stated that a slight wave surf following 

 the eruption was felt in the Bay of Fort 



de France on the 20th of May, making 

 a peculiar roll of surf. He also esti- 

 mated that the fall of ejecta averaged 

 376 tons to the square mile. 



According to many, this eruption still 

 further destroyed St Pierre, leveling the 

 remaining walls almost to the ground 

 and burying the dead in the streets be- 

 neath a new shower of lapilli. A self- 

 recording barometer at Fort de France 

 also made a notch at the time of this 

 explosion. 



On May 25 I witnessed a frightful 

 summit eruption from Fond St Denis. 

 This was accompanied by lightning ef- 

 fects and what I believe to be the igni- 

 tion of gases. An account of this erup- 

 tion was described in the New York 

 Herald of Sunday, June 8, by Mr Morse. 



May 29, at 8 p. m., while on board 

 the French steamer, the captain of the 

 French steamer D'Assas came aboard 

 and told Admiral Servan that he had j ust 

 witnessed an overflow of incandescent 

 lapilli from the crater rim. 



On May 30, at 1.45 p. m., the cable 

 via Puerto Plata broke again. Almost 

 simultaneously vast quantities of mud 

 flowed out of the northern crater and 

 torrents of it invaded the plateau of the 

 Vive plantation. This was the last bit 

 of news I received on the Dixie from 

 Consul Ayme as we weighed anchor for 

 the United States. 



Reports of eruptions have continued 

 up to the 'last few days, and will prob- 

 ably continue for an indefinite time, until 

 Pelee's vents once more clog up and the 

 surface manifestations gradually dimin- 

 ish until the mountain sleeps again. 



CONCLUSIONS 



THE GEOLOGICAL LESSON 



It is now evident that the destruction 

 of St Pierre, viewed from a broader 

 standpoint than human disaster, was 

 but an episode in a group of general 

 phenomena constituting the 1902 erup- 



tion of Montagne Pelee, and that the 

 eruption of 1902 is but an episode in a 

 series of events which have been taking 

 place through long epochs of geologic 

 time. Let us, then, forget, if possible, 

 for a moment, the great catastrophe, 

 and consider the phenomena as a whole. 



