[ 19 ] 
time may have effaced all figns of the volcano from 
whence they proceeded. Except this rock, which is 
evidently lava and full of vitrifications like that of 
Vcfavius, all the rocks upon the coaft of Baia are of 
tufa. 
I have obfervcd in the lava of Vefuvius and Etna, 
as in this, that the bottom as well as the furface of it 
was rough and porous, like the cinders or fcori‘<E from 
an iron foundery, and that for about a foot from the 
furface and from the bottom, they were not near fo 
folid and compa<fl: as towards the centre ; which 
muff undoubtedly proceed from the impreflion of 
the air upon the vitrified matter whilft in fufion. 
I mention this circumftance, as it may ferve to point 
out true lava’s with more certainty. The ancient 
name of the^Solfaterra was, Forum Vulcanic a ftrong 
proof of its origin from fubterraneous fire. The 
degree of heat that the Solfaterra has preferved for fo 
many ages, feems to have calcined the ftones upon 
its cone, and in its crater, as they arc very white and 
crumble eafily in the hotteft parts. 
We come next to the new mountain near Puzzole, 
which, being of fo very late a formation, preferves its 
conical fliape entire, and produces as yet but a very 
flender vegetation. It has a crater almoft as deep as 
the cone is high, which may be near a quarter of a 
mile perpendicular, and is in fhape a regular inverted 
cone. At the bafis of this new mountain (which is 
more than three miles in circumference), the land upon 
the fea fhore, and even that which is wafhed by the 
fea itfelf, is burning hot for above the fpace of an 
hundred yards ; if you take up a handful of the 
D 2 land 
