162 
COMPENDIUM OF GEOGRAPHY AND TRAVEL 
Of the former history of the volcano, geology tells us 
something. The island of Krakatau and its satellites, 
previous to the eruption, formed in reality only the lip 
or edge of a crater, the wreck of some former volcanic 
cone, which was probably not less than 10,000 or 12,000 
feet high and 25 miles in circumference at its base. 
That this great mountain must have been gradually built 
up in comparatively modern times is evident from the 
fact that beneath the mass of which its ruins are com¬ 
posed there are deposits of post-Tertiary age, which in 
turn rest on the widely distributed Tertiary rocks so well 
developed in Java and Sumatra. Subsequent to the 
ancient eruption which destroyed this mountain, secondary 
craters must at some time have formed within and around 
the eviscerated cone, and the volcano was in this condition 
when the great eruption of 1883 ensued. The only out¬ 
burst previously recorded in history occurred in 1680, 
when all the forests clothing the islands are said to have 
been destroyed. 
On the morning of May 20th, 1883, the dormant 
volcano again woke suddenly to life. The explosions 
were sufficiently violent to be heard at Batavia, 100 
miles distant, where dust fell on the following day, and 
the officers of a German man-of-war in the vicinity 
estimated the height of the column of matter vomited 
forth as over 36,000 feet. Considerable as the dis¬ 
turbance must have been, it does not appear to have 
been attended with any very injurious results, and 
although the eruption lasted without intermission until 
the appalling finale on August 26 th and 27th, it steadily 
decreased in violence until the end of June. Pleasure- 
parties were even arranged in Batavia to visit the island, 
and photographs were taken of the scene. Towards the 
beginning of July an exacerbation of the phenomena 
