504 
DKS. T. AXDIiKSOX AXD J. .S. FLETT OX THE EKUPTIOXS OF THE 
On July 9tli, when we were ofif Carbet, there were two black clouds. It was 
obvious before the first emerged that activity was increasing, but not in our opinion to 
a dangerous degree. The first cloud w^elled out quietly in the twilight, and was quite 
a small affair. It was black from the first—-a surging, foaming, boiling mass. Slowly 
it gathered speed, and came rushing along. The second was much larger, and in the 
darkness we coidd see that with it there was a glowing avalanche of red-liot dust. 
It came doAvn with far higher velocity, hut, like the other, slowed down rapidly when 
it reached the sea. With the first we heard no noise, with the second there was a 
loud angry growl. Botli were full of lightnings, and in the features of their surface 
so like that no essential difference could be distinguished between them. 
It is in all cases difficult to learn what happens after the great black cloud has 
passed. Not many survive that experience, and the terrible shock they receive 
unfits them, as a rule, for making exact observations of what is going on around 
them. But thei'e are a few both in St. Vincent and in Martinique who have passed 
through that ordeal of fire, and their recollections of what followed are interesting, 
and at any rate worth placing on record. 
In the Carib Country of St. Vincent, as already described, the hot wave lasted a few 
minutes, perhaps at most two or three. The darkness was absolute at first, but 
cleared slowly till it was possible to make one’s way about in the open air, but not 
within the homes. The mountain continued to thunder and roar; hot stones fell 
through the air; there was a strong smell of sulphurous acid, and the fine, dry du.st 
irritated the eyes and throat. Ap])arently there was no rain, and no second visitation 
Ipy the dread and deadly cloud, but great explosions of steam wei'e taking place 
within the crater, and foi’cing into the air quantities of dust, stones, scoria, and 
l:)ombs, which fell in a continuous hail on all the country round. The moimtahi was 
veiled in clouds of ashes and vapour, and no one on the island could see what was 
taking place there till the morning of the next day. But the noises, the rocking of 
the ground, the continuous fall of stones and ashes, exactly resemble the features of 
eruptions of the usual type in which the explosive violence of the steam within the 
magma acts mostly in an upward dii-ection. 
This is also true of the later eruptions of the Soufriere during May of this ^^ear. 
For hours the mountain roared, and stones and dust fell through the air, landing with 
great force. But there was no second outburst of the black cloud, and nothing which 
can he regaixled as in any way unusual in an explosive volcano. Having delivered 
itself of the avalanche of dust, the A'olcano settles down to spout its gigantic column 
of va})our into the air, .sending up with it great cpiantities of fine du.st and hot stones, 
and this goes on till the subterranean forces are exhausted, and a period of quiescence, 
or, at least greatly reduced activity, ensues. 
At St. Pierre hardly one was left to tell the tale of destruction, and those whose 
lives were spared were so busy in taking mea.sures to relieve pain and escape from the 
fatal harbour that they had little time to attend to the scientific ]>henomena. But 
