EARTHQUAKES AND VOLCANOES. 379 
forth by the sun, — that source of life and warmth and 
growth. 
An ri yet, here is a country where volcanoes cluster, 
— their number reaching several hundred, — where hot- 
springs are more common than the cold-springs in most 
countries, and where earthquakes are very frequent and 
destructive. The volcanoes of the Hawaiian Archipelago 
are larger, those of Java more destructive, and the equa¬ 
torial group of South America is loftier; but here be¬ 
tween Popocatepetl and Istaccuahuatl, the giants of the 
plain of Anahuac, and the Costa Rican Turrialba extends 
an unbroken line of mighty cones and gaping craters. 
Somewhere on that line, smoke is ever rising ; and at 
night the mariner along the Pacific coast sees the beacon- 
fires lighted by no mortal hand. 
We must not expect to find in native records any 
careful account, or even notice, of eruptions or earth¬ 
quakes ; if referred to at all, it will be much as in the 
quotation I have already given from the “ Popul Vuh,” 
where Cabracan is said to be in the habit of shaking 
the mountains. In the three centuries and a half since 
Spain sent her educated sons to this land, with the 
exception of some three hundred earthquakes and half a 
hundred eruptions, we have no better record. While it is 
true that geology has existed as a science only within 
the present century, yet one would suppose that a catas¬ 
trophe causing the death of hundreds of people and the 
destruction of much property would be entered with some 
minuteness in the annals of the time ; but were it not for 
the masses and church processions to calm the trembling 
earth or appease the angry mountains, the worthy padres 
would perhaps have failed to notice these disturbances of 
