245 



archipelago of the Canaries may exhibit some 

 real rocks of secondary formation, if we recol- 

 lect, that subterraneous fires have been there re- 

 kindled, in the midst of a system of basalts and 

 very ancient lavas. 



I should wander too long from the principal 

 object of my researches, were I to pursue a sub- 

 ject, in which mere conjecture supplies the place 

 of geological fact. From those dark times, when 

 the elements, subjected to the same laws, had 

 not yet attained their present equilibrium, I come 

 back to a period less tumultuous, nearer our own 

 age, and on which tradition and history may 

 throw some light. We seek in vain in the Pe- 

 riplus of Hanno or of Scylax the first notions 

 written on the eruptions of the Peak of TenerifFe. 

 Those navigators sailed timidly along the coast, 

 anchoring every evening in some bay, and had 

 no knowledge of a volcano distant fifty-six 

 leagues from the coast of Africa. Hanno never- 

 theless relates, that he saw torrents of light, 

 which seemed to fall on the sea ; that every night 

 the coast was covered with fires ; and that the 

 great mountain, called the Car of the Gods, had 

 appeared to throw up sheets of flame, which 

 rose even to the clouds. But this mountain, 

 placed to the north of the island of the Gorilli*, 



* It was in this island that the Carthaginian admiral saw, 

 for the first time, a large species of apes of human form, the 

 Gorilli. He describes them like women, their body covered 



