178 



Messrs. Carpenter and Jeffreys on 



[Dec. 8, 



came in sight of Syracuse, with the lofty mass of Etna as a magnificent 

 background in the remote distance. The clouds which lay upon its 

 summit during the earlier part of the day gradually dispersed as we ap- 

 proached it, so that we could distinctly trace the outline of its cone, save 

 where this was obscured by a constantly shifting semitransparent cloud. 

 Whether this was a light smoke given off from the crater, or a film of va« 

 pour condensed by the contact of a current of warm moist air with the 

 colder surface of the mountain-summit, we were unable to distinguish, 

 though we watched it with great interest during the whole afternoon. — 

 We steamed quietly along the Sicilian coast during the night, so that 

 sunrise the next morning found us in the narrowest part of the Strait of 

 Messina, between Messina and Reggio ; and we shall not easily forget the 

 beauty of the spectacle we then beheld on either shore. Passing through 

 the once-dreaded Charybdis, the dangers of which are rather poetical than 

 real, and leaving on our right the picturesque castle-crowned rock of 

 Scylla, we passed out of the " Faro," which narrows at its northernmost 

 extremity to about 3± miles, into the open sea to the North of Sicily, 

 studded by the Lipari Isles, and steered direct for Stromboli, stopping at 

 10 a.m. to take a Sounding (Station 61). This gave us a depth of 392 

 fathoms, and a Bottom-temperature of 55°- 7, which afforded no indication 

 of unusual elevation. Here again we found the Density of the Bottom- 

 water scarcely in excess of that of the Surface-water ; and it was even 

 lower than that of the Surface-water in another Sounding taken somewhat 

 further on (Station 62), and at the depth of 730 fathoms, which gave a 

 Bottom-temperature of 55°-3. 



Sp. Grav. Chlorine. 



Surface 1*0281 21*32 



Bottom, 392 fathoms 1-0282 21*36 



Bottom, 730 fathoms 1-0280 21-22 



60. This result, again, surprised us much at the time ; but we are now 

 inclined to attribute it to the decrease of surface-evaporation consequent 

 upon the marked decrease in the heating-power of the Sun, which showed 

 itself in the change of the relative Temperatures of the Sea and Air ; for 

 whilst, for some days before we put into Malta, the Surface-temperature of 

 the Sea had ranged between 7 6° and 78°, and the Temperature of the Air had 

 been usually about 1° higher, we now found that while the Surface-tem- 

 perature of the Sea ranged between 73°' 6 and 76°*6, the Temperature of 

 the Air was between 2° and 4° lower. This difference continued to show 

 itself nearly all the way to Gibraltar ; the daily averages of the Surface- 

 temperature of the Sea ranging between 73°* 1 and 75°- 6, whilst those of 

 the temperature of the Air ranged between 68°-5 and 72°. We now ap- 

 proached the rugged cone of Stromboli, from the summit of which there 

 was constantly issuing, — as has been the case since the time when the neigh- 

 bouring island of Hiera was fabled to be the workshop of Vulcan, — a cloud 



