190 NEWER PLIOCENE BEDS OF VESUVIUS AND ETNA. [Ch. XIII. 



a larger number of fossils obtained from these beds in Ischia, Buccinum 

 semistriatum and 'Murex vaginatus (see fig. 141) bad been found. 

 Both of these shells were supposed to be extinct ; but although this 

 is true of the first, which is a common Subapennine shell, it is not so 

 of the other, for the Murex still lives in the Mediterranean, though 

 rare,* and recent specimens of it may be seen in Mr. Cuming's col- 

 lection in London, from which the annexed figure is taken. Several 

 Italian geologists, who had not examined Ischia, hastily adopted 

 the classification of Signor Spada ; but M. Puggaard, 

 who was well acquainted with the island, immediately Pi s- 141 - 



entered his protest against it ; f and there can be 

 no doubt, from the general character of the organic 

 remains, that the mass of Epomeo was formed be- 

 neath the waters of the sea at the close of the 

 Newer Pliocene period, and was raised to a height 

 of 2600 feet above its original level in Post-pliocene 

 times. 



Vesuvius. — The old cone of Vesuvius, or Monte 

 Somma, is, geologically speaking, so modern that 

 the eruption by which it was formed burst through Murex vaginatus, 

 marine clays and tuffs of the same age as those of PhD « 



Ischia above mentioned. Fragments of tuff and conglomerate found 

 amongst the ancient ejectamenta, and constituting part of the strata 

 laid open in the ravine called Fosso Grande and in the liivo di Quag- 

 lia, the latter 972 feet high above the sea, have supplied Signor 

 Guiscardi with 100 shells, among which one, and one only, namely, 

 Buccinum semistriatum, before alluded to, is extinct. The oldest erup- 

 tions, therefore, of the Campi Phlegrsei, or volcanic regions of Naples, 

 took place precisely at the close of the Newer Pliocene period, when 

 about one shell only in a hundred differed from those now living in the 

 Mediterranean. 



Sicily, Eastern base of Mount Etna. — At several points north of 

 Catania, on the eastern seacoast of Sicily, as at Aci-Castello, for ex- 

 ample, Trezza, and Nizzeti, marine strata, associated with volcanic tuffs 

 and basaltic lavas, are seen, which belong to a period when the first 

 igneous eruptions of Mount Etna were taking place in a shallow bay 

 of the Mediterranean. During my first visit to Sicily in 1828, I col- 

 lected sixty-five species of shells from these clays and sands, which may 

 be said, together with the associated igneous products, to constitute 

 the foundations of the great volcano. With the help of M. Deshayes, 

 I was enabled to publish a list of their names, J showing that nearly 

 all of them agreed with species, now inhabiting the adjoining sea. 



* Lyell on Mount Etna, Phil. Trans., p. 118, 1858. 



f Bulletin de la Soc. Geol. de France, torn. xi. 2e ser., p. 12, and tom. xiii. p. 

 285, and xv. p. 362. 



^ Principles of Geology, vol. iii., Appendix, 1833. 



