Notice of Active and Extinct Volcanos. 281 



Remarked that the heat of the water had carried away all the 

 pitch from their vessel. 



" During the ten subsequent years, the volcanic action had 

 given rise to several other eruptions, but the same reporter states, 

 that in 1712 all was quiet, and no other indication of the kind 

 existed, excepting a quantity of sulphur and bitumen, which 

 floated on, without mixing with the waters. Its circumference 

 at that time was about four miles. 



" It is important, with reference to the natural history of vol- 

 canos, to remark that in this case, as in many others, the moun- 

 tain appears to have been elevated, before the crater existed, or 

 gaseous matters were given out. According to Bourguignon 

 smoke was not observed till twenty-six days after the appearance 

 of the raised rocks." 



Milo appears also to be volcanic ; it abounds in hot springs, 

 sulphureous and chalybeate : sulphur is sublimed in the crevi- 

 ces of the rock, and alum is abundant as it was in the time of 

 Pliny. Mere, as well as in the Phlegraean fields, the noxious 

 miasmata so abound, that the few inhabitants of this once 

 populous island, are the very pictures of wretchedness and 

 disease ; perhaps, however, attributable in part to other causes. 

 The theatre, which was covered with a shower of volcanic 

 ashes, has been in part uncovered, and the steps were found 

 to be of the marble of the island, fresh and uninjured. It is 

 probable that Argentine, the ancient Cimoli ; Cerigo, the an- 

 cient Cythera ; Lemnos, and other islands are more or less of 

 volcanic origin. 



Continent of Greece. 



Whether the burning mountain of Megalopolis, mentioned 

 by Pliny, and the mud eruptions of the Lelantic fields, are 

 connected with volcanic action, cannot be determined. 



" The neighborhood of Troezene in Argolis, would appear 

 from Ovid to have been the seat of a volcanic eruption, which 

 created an entire mountain, just in the same manner as in the 

 last century the mountain of Jorullo was elevated in the midst 

 of the table land of Mexico. 



" The description of Ovid is so applicable to both these 

 events, that I have introduced an extract from it in the frontis- 

 piece of this work, which represents the mountain Jorullo as 

 described by Humbolt. 



Vol. XIII.— No. 2. 11 



