This abstract, which is reprinted from the 1 Geographical Journal ’ by permission 
of the Royal Geographical Society, represents the substance of a lecture 
delivered to the York Philosophical Society on December 19, 1907, by the 
President of the Society, Dr. Tempest Anderson. 
THE VOLCANOES OF GUATEMALA.* 
By Dr. TEMPEST ANDERSON. 
I spent nine months, including the winter of 1906-7, among the 
volcanoes of Mexico, Guatemala, and the West Indies. The first and 
last named groups are comparatively well known, while those of 
Guatemala, though equally, if not more important, have, owing to 
their remote and inaccessible position, scarcely attracted the attention 
they deserve from English geologists, though they have been described 
by a French commission under Dollfus and Montserrat! in 1868, and 
more recently by Prof. Karl Sapper, J of Tubingen. They consist of a 
row of giant cones averaging 10,000 to 12,000 feet in height, roughly 
parallel with the Pacific coast. As viewed from the deck of a Pacific 
mail steamer they present a most imposing appearance, for though 
really at a distance of 50 miles from the coast, their whole height is 
visible at once, as no other range of mountains intervenes, the coast 
being a belt composed of Quarternary beds which only rise into low 
foothills. These foothills, the Costa, are covered with coffee plantations, 
from which the well-known Guatemala coffee is largely produced. 
None of these volcanoes is habitually in eruption, like Izalco in 
Salvador, or Stromboli in the Lipari islands; on the contrary, their 
eruptions usually take place only after intervals of many years, even 
centuries, during which the volcano is quiescent and may appear 
* Royal Geographical Society, January 13, 1908. Map, p. 490. 
f ‘Voyage Ge'ologique dans les Republiques de Guatemala et de Salvador.’ Par 
MM. Dollfus et E. de Montserrat. Paris : Imprimerie Imperiale. 1868. 
X ‘ Mittelamerikanishe Reisen und Studien.’ Dr. Karl Sapper. Vieweg. 
Braunschweig. 1902. ‘In den Vulkangebeiten Mittelamerikas und Westindiens.’ 
Dr. Karl Sapper. Stuttgart: E. Nagele. 1905. Also several smaller articles, of 
which the following especially deals with this district, and has been freely quoted : 
Die Vulcanischen Ereignisse in Mittelamerika,’ in Jahre 1902. Karl Sapper. 
Neuen Jahrbuch fur Mineralogie, etc.,’ 1904, Bd. I. Stuttgart: Nagele. 
A 
