gS Sir William Hamilton's Account of 
of boots, to which I had for the purpose added a new and 
thick sole, were burnt through on this expedition. It was not 
possible to get up to the great crater of Vesuvius, nor had any- 
one yet attempted it. The horrid chasms that exist from the 
spot where the late eruption first took place, in a straight line 
for near two miles towards the sea, cannot be imagined. They 
formed vallies more than two hundred feet deep, and from 
half to a mile wide ; and where the fountains of fiery matter 
existed during the eruption, are little mountains with deep 
craters. Ten thousand men, in as many years, could not, surely, 
make such an alteration on the face of Vesuvius, as has been 
made by nature in the short space of five hours. Except the 
exhalations of sulphureous and vitriolic vapours, which broke 
out from different spots of the line abovementioned, and tinged 
the surface of the ashes and scorias in those parts with either 
a deep or pale yellow with a reddish ochre colour, or a bright 
white, and in some parts with a deep green and azure blue 
(so that the whole together had the effect of an iris), all 
around us had the appearance of a sandy desert. We went on 
the top of seven of the most considerable of the new-formed 
mountains, and looked into their craters, which on some of 
them appeared to be little short of half a mile in circumfe- 
rence ; and although the exterior perpendicular height of any 
of them did not exceed two hundred feet, the- depth of their 
inverted cone within was three times as great. It would not 
have been possible for us to have breathed on these new moun- 
tains near their craters, if we had not taken the precaution of 
tying a doubled handkerchief over our mouths and nostrils ; and 
even with that precaution we could not resist long, the fumes 
of the vitriolic acid were so exceedingly penetrating, and of 
