46 Proceedings of the Royal Society 
jufjoll (Cubilia or “Chamber Hills”), are at least thirty-eight 
direct geographical miles from My-vatn (midge -water), and forty- 
live from the nearest seashore. Nos. 1, 2, and 3 vents are more 
distant from the lake, and but little nearer the coast. The 
non-maritime Andine volcanoes are popularly supposed to be con- 
nected by fissures and strata-faults with the Pacific. Here, how- 
ever, the foci are separated from the Atlantic eastward by the 
valley of the broad and deep Jokulsd 1 Axarflrfii, the longest, if 
not the largest, river in Iceland. To the west they are guarded by 
the Skjalfandi Fljdt, and south by the huge Yatnajokull, whilst 
palagonite is not a rock which maintains permanent fissures like 
porphyry. I can only suggest that the eternal snows of the 
mighty neve take the place of lake and sea water. 
Our approach to Iceland was heralded by volcanic phenomena. 
On Friday, July 8, as my shipmates were recovering from the 
sufferings which began in Pentland Firth, we found the milky 
blue sea patched and streaked with what many supposed to be rye 
— the cargo of some wrecked vessel — but which proved to be 
pumice, the largest piece hardly equalling a bean. On the return 
voyage (August 9) we passed through a similar discharge, and we 
heard of dense and choking ash-showers. Landing (July 10) at 
Husavlk, the old export harbour of the great Northern Brimstone 
Mines, we found burned stone thrown up in tons on the beach 
north-east and south-west of the factory. A few of the bits were 
equal to a man’s fist : some were slightly vitreous, and others had 
a fibrous texture like asbestos ; they much resembled those brought 
from the Askja by Mr W. L. Watts. Lastly, when we approached 
the focus of eruption we picked up common specimens of an inter- 
mediate size, where certainly none existed in 1872. Our maximum 
distance then was 70 or 80 miles, and the line of our direction was 
from south-west and west to north-east and east. As will presently 
appear, a single morning (March 19) is supposed to have discharged 
3840 tons in four hours. All authorities are agreed that the ashes 
fell in Norway within twenty-four hours — a rapid but not an 
unusual rate of progress. In the Hekla eruption of 1693 the 
scoriae were also carried by the winds in one day to the Foeroe 
Islands ; the same was the case with the Skaptar outbreak of 
1783; and in 1845 the goodwives of Shetland, when bleaching 
