The Eruption of Mount Vesuvius 



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A Pine Tree Overwhelmed by Lava, Boscotrecase, 1906 



visible on this side of the mountain. 

 Everything was covered with pebbles, 

 sand, and dust. Vesuvius was never 

 more completely a "cinder cone" in out- 

 ward appearance than it is at the present 

 time. The slope of the main cone aver- 

 ages about 29 °, and the ejecta seem to 

 have slipped down this slope to form 

 thick taluses at the bottom. Here and 

 there large angular pieces of hard rock 

 have fallen, up to 5 feet in diameter. 



Climbing the cone was not especially 

 difficult, though it was very steep in 

 places. By making a somewhat zigzag 

 track and keeping on the radial elevations 

 rather than in the shallow troughs, hard 

 pan could be found to walk upon. Some 

 •of this was scoured old hard lava, other- 

 wise it was closely wedged or plastered 

 fragments, whereas the gullies were 

 filled with deep sand. It was necessary to 



be very cautious to avoid starting rocks 

 down on those below. The steepness in- 

 creased up to a point near the edge of 

 the crater, and then it became slightly 

 less. The edge of the crater itself is the 

 upper rim as seen below ; there are no 

 intervening ridges. Therefore the ab- 

 ruptness of the fall-off, when we finally 

 came to it, was startling in the extreme. 

 The wind had steadily increased and was 

 pelting our necks with stinging sand 

 grains which surged in whirling clouds 

 all about us. It was impossible to face 

 this bombardment except during lulls in 

 the gale ; hence photography was ac- 

 complished under difficulties and the fly- 

 ing dust was ruinous to cameras. Only 

 occasionally did the dim sunlight sift 

 through the mixture of sand, steam, and 

 cloud. In those lucent intervals, however, 

 we could make out an inward slope of 35 



