which destroyed the Town Car accas in 1812. 279 
occasion to notice. Since the month of November 1796, a thick 
column of smoke had issued from the volcano of Pasto, west of the 
town of that name, and near the valley of Rio Guaytara. The 
mouths of the volcano are lateral, and placed on its western de- 
clivity, yet during three successive months the column rose so 
much higher than the ridge of the mountain, that it was con- 
stantly visible to the inhabitants of the town of Pasto. They 
related to us their astonishment, when, on the 4th of February 
1797, they observed the smoke disappear in an instant, without 
feeling any shock whatever. At that very moment, sixty-five 
leagues to the south, between Chimborazo, Tunguragua, and 
the Altar (Capac IJrcii,) the town of Riobamba was overthrown 
by the most dreadful earthquake of which tradition has trans- 
mitted the history. Is it possible to doubt from this coincidence 
of phenomena, that the vapours issuing from the small apertures 
or vcntanillas of the volcano of Pasto, had an influence on the 
pressure of those elastic fluids, which shook the ground of the 
kingdom of Quito, and destroyed in a few minutes thirty or 
forty thousand inhabitants ? 
In order to explain these great effects of volcanic reactions^ 
and to prove, that the group or system of the volcanoes of the 
West India Islands may sometimes shake the continent, it was 
necessary to cite the Cordillera of the Andes. Geological rea- 
soning can be supported only on the analogy of facts that are' 
recent, and consequently well authenticated : and in what other 
region of the globe could we find greater, and at the same 
time more varied volcanic phenomena, than in that double chain 
of mountains heaved up by fire ? in that land, where Nature 
has covered every summit and every valley with her wonders ? 
If we consider a burning crater only as an insulated phenome- 
non, if we satisfy ourselves with examining the mass of stony 
substances which it has thrown up, the volcanic action at the 
surface of the globe will appear neither very powerful nor very 
extensive. But the image of this action swells in tlie mind, 
when we study the relations that link together volcanoes of the 
same group ; for instance, those of Naples and Sicily, of the 
Canary Islands, of the Azores, of* the Caribbee Islands, of Mexi- 
co, of Guatimalo, amj of the table-land of Quito;, when w^; 
