[ 7 j: 
bafis. The hva rliat ran from it, and on which - 
there are as yet no figns of vegetation, is fourteen- 
miles in length, and in many parts fix in breadth; it 
reached Catania, and defiroyed part of its walls, 
buried an amphitheatre, an aquedudt, and many 
other monuments of its ancient grandeur, which, 
till then, had refilled the hand of time; and ran a 
confiderable length into the fea, fo as to have once 
formed a beautiful and fafe harbour; but it was foon 
after filled up by a frefh torrent of the fame inflamed 
matter, a circumflance the Catanians lament to this 
day, as they are without a port. There has been no 
l'uch eruption fince, though there are figns of many;, 
more terrible, that have preceded it. 
For two or three miles round the mountain raifed 
by this eruption, all is barren, and covered with 
afhes ; this ground, as well as the mountain itfelf, 
will in time certainly be as fertile as many other 
mountains in its neighbourhood, that have been like— - 
wife formed by explofion . If the dates of thefe ex-- 
plofions could be afeertained, it would be very cu- 
rious, and mark the progrefs of time with refpedt to 
the return of vegetation, as the mountains raifed by ■ 
them are in different Hates ; thofe (which I imagine 
to be the moll modern) are covered with alhes only; , 
others of an older date, with fmall plants and herbs, 
and the moft antient, with the largelt timber trees X 
ever faw; but I believe the latter are fo very ancient, . 
as to be far out of the reach of hiftory. At the foot 
of the mountain raifed by the eruption of the year 
1669, there is a hole, through which, by means ^ 
of a rope, we defeended into feveral fubterraneous , 
caverns, branching out and extending much farther 
ani 
