100 ISLANDS WHICH HAVE lUSKS) i'tOM THE SEA. , 
been occasioned by an action between two ships, to 
cause we universally attributed its origin. This opinion ' 
however, in a very short time changed, from the smokej 
creasing and ascending in much larger bodies than c 
possibly have been produced by such an event ; and, 
heal'd an account, prior to our sailing from Lisbon, tl>-‘ 
the preceding January or February a volcano had burst 
within the'sea near St. Michaefs, we immediately condj' 
that the smoke we saw proceeded from that cause, anu<^ 
our anchoring the next morning in the road of 
Gada, we found this conjecture correct as to thecausej j, 
not as to the time ; the eruption of January having to'^^, 
subsided, and the present one having only burst for"! (jii 
days prior to our approach, and about three miles di 
from the one before alluded to.- j,r 
Desirous of examining as minutely as possible a coP^^ 
tion so extraordinary between two such powerful elcifl^ t 
I set off Irom the city of Ponta del Gada on the moni'^f; 
the 14th, in company with Mr, Read, the Consul 
of the Azores, and two other gentlemen. After 
atwut twenty miles across the N. W. end of the is'^” 
St. Michael's, we came to tlie edge of a cliff, whenc h- 
volcano burst suddenly upon our view in the most t^ ^ 
and awful grandeur. It was only a short mile 
base of the cliff, which was nearly perpendicular, and * ^1 
ed the margin of the sea; this cliff being, as nearly •;( 
could judge, from three to four hundred feet high. I "p 
you an adequate idea of the scene by description, .j/ 
beyotid my powers ; but, for your satisfaction, I sh* 
tempt it. , g jf'i 
Imagine an immense body of smoke rising from ta 
the suffice of which was marked by the silvery ripp*' j^'t 
the waves, occasioned by the light and steady bree^^ 
dental to those climates in summer. In a quiescent^ 
it had the appearance of a circular cloud revolving / 
water like an horizontal wheel, in various and 
involutions, expanding itselfgradually on the lee (of 
suddenly a column of the blackest cinders, ashes, and 
would shoot up ill the form of a spire, at an angle o ^ 
ten to twenty degrees from a perpendicular line, 
of inclination being universally to windwarel ; this ' / 
pidly succeeded by a second, third, and fourth sho've > 
