SOUFRTERE, AND ON A VISIT TO MONTAGNE PEL EE, IN 1902. 
503 
catastrophe, that death overtook most of the inhabitants before they knevr wliat 
had hap|)ened. 
It was otherwise in St. Vincent on the previous afternoon. For an hour or more 
the mountain had laboured and groaned, quivering in the throes of the eruption, 
great explosions followed one another at comparatively short intervals, the emumous 
steam cloud got larger and larger, the violence of its ascent more and more terrible, 
the lightnings flashed, and loud crashing noises hurst on the ears of the observers. 
Yet after all the climax came suddenly. There was an “ enormously increased 
activity over the whole area,” and with a terriflc noise the great black cloud surged 
from the crater, and in one torrent poured down upon the valleys and right out 
to sea. 
Captain C alder was of opinion that the cloud ascended in the air and then curled 
over and came down the mountain slopes exactly in the same way as some have 
described the fatal Iflast in Martinique :—“ As the top of the stupendous cloud 
bent over toward our little village the weird fascination gave place to a feeling of 
impending doom. It was vividly apparent that in a very short space of time this 
dust-charged pall of sulphurous smoke must envelop the distilct for miles.” + 
The eru})tion of Pelee on IMay 24th was seen by Professor Hill. He describes 
it in the following words| ;— 
“ Stepping out of the door I saw before me a perfect tropical night. Not a cloud obscured the starlit 
firmament. Suddenly, to the north and above Pelee, there was a dim Hare of light like the sheet¬ 
lightning of a summer storm. This was the reHection of the incandescent molten mass within. Following 
this a great spherical cloud, with hundreds of boiling and seething coin'olutions, slowly rose above the 
vent. It had hardly appeared before it was followed by a blinding flash of light, like a great gun flash, 
from the mouth of the crater, accompanied by long, deep-pitched detonations from the Ijosom of the 
mountain. Over the crater’s rim followed a fountain shower of incandescent pumice, which looked like 
molten fire. Hardly had the cloud-ball reached the air when around and through it flashed a thousand 
lightning-like streaks, with here and there great balls of fire. Vhile standing in mute amazement 
observhig this phenomenon at the apparently safe distance of some 3 miles, I was horrified to see the cloud 
fall suddenly, flatten, and float out horizontally into the sky like an aerial river directly toward and above 
me—a ribbon of inky blackness, and coming slowly, yet so fast that it was easy for me to see that it was 
not to be escaped by running.” 
According to Professor Hill’s shitemeuts it would appear that tlie black cloud 
floated out horizontally in the air. If so it cannot liave been of the same nature as 
those we saw on July 9th or that of May 8th, for these flowed along the ground. 
But in this case also it came suddenlv with a loud noise and a Inio-ht liolit from the 
J O O 
crater. The “ fountain shower of incandescent pumice” was the avalanche of red-hot 
ashes, which, as a rule, is visible only aftei' dark. 
* Mr. T. M. McDonald’s Diary, ‘Sentry’ Newspaper, Kingstown, St. Vincent, May, 1902. 
t ‘Century Magazine,’ vol. Ixiv., p. 636, 1902. 
i ‘Century Magazine,’ September, 1902, vol. Ixiv., p. 77S, 
