\y 
ty 
180.) 
found abundance of thofe on the outfide 
of the crater at all times, the caufe of 
which I have witneffed for hours together 
in the year 1784, when every two minutes 
a prodigious collefion of them, fome of 
not lefs than a ton weight, as I fhould 
guefs, were regularly impelled near one 
hundred feet into the air, and as regularly 
fell again, attended with a noife much re- 
fembling. diftant thunder. Why thefe 
French gentlemen fhould in thefe times, 
when every body that has been at Naples 
knows that theve is no fort of danger in 
the thing, choofe to give fuch a terrific 
account of their perfonal rifks, I cannot 
conceive; butI can affure you, that there is 
none whatever, except in the fuperftitious 
imagination of the ftupid Lazzaroni, and 
one of them, I fee, had the honour to be 
the firf? to venture down—for, when I 
afcended the inner crater, with a gentle- 
man of Ireland, in March, 1784, had it not 
then been in the ftate I have juit defcribed, 
and the bottom enveloped in thick {ul- 
phurous clouds, we fhould have made no 
{eruple to go as low as. we could, and I 
actually did defcend till the wind blew the 
vapouracrofs me,and compelled my return, 
which, fo far from being barmle/s, 1 then 
found nearly as fuffocating as the fmoke of 
brimftone. As to the defcent, it was 
exaétly the fame angle ‘with the afcent, as 
it muft naturally be, having been com- 
pofed by fhowers of cinders falling like 
the fands of-an hour-glafs, and equally 
fmooth every where; fo that you, or any 
one, mult be convinced, that if it was not 
difficult to afcend the outfide, there could 
be none in defcending inwards: in fact, 
we were about half-leg deep when we 
went in it with hafte (not knee-deep, as 
they talk of ), but, if we proceeded flowly, 
not much over the ancles; the ftones, in- 
deed, that were not well bedded, having 
been recently caft over, were treacherous 
fupports, butthey only excited the laughter 
of our friends, who did not choofe to come 
up, when fometimes they conveyed us a 
few feet forward before they again ftop- 
ped. And, inftead of the fides being per- 
pendicular, as thefe gentlemen are pleafed 
to defcribe them, we found them to only 
make an angle of about fifty degrees at 
moft, TIhele eminences, which are fo ter- 
ribly defcribed, as crumbling down, and 
Spots on which they had food as difappear- 
ing, we faw: and: they were nothing but 
fragments of other and older cones that, 
being probably wet, had adhered like 
~ brackets to the fides of that on which we 
ftood—my friend ventured on one of them 
very imprudently,confidexing the then tate 
» 
Obfervations on the Crater of Vefuvius. 
297 
of the volcano, becaufe,if he had been carried 
far down by the giving wayof its bale, he 
might have got into the denfe vapour, and 
been overcome by it, and got intothe vortex 
of the explofion, and received a blow from 
the falling materials which it threw up3 
but, had the crater been years in cooling, 
(as was the ftate of it when thefe late tra- 
vellers went down) there would have been 
no danger, and it would have only aéted 
as acar to facilitate his defcent agreeably, 
for the materials being foft and light, we . 
often fell and {lid far without the fmalleft 
injury. What thefe gentlemen had done 
tc be fo covered with afhes and fmoke, 
cannot conjecture: for, you may depend 
upon it, and you know me, that there is 
nothing to dirt one inany degree that may 
not be brufhed off with the hand in thefe 
dry afhes, and the {moke is only a vapour 
that foils nothing.. There are many other 
parts of this account, which-fo evidently — 
contradict themfelves, that I can only at- 
tribute them to errors of the tranflator, 
fuch as the difficulty of returning, with 
their fecond defcent,&c.&c. But as correét 
information is, and ever ought to be, the 
object of your Magazine, I fend you this 
by way of antidote to thofe fears which 
fuch an account might excite in the breaft 
of future travellers, becoming the means 
of depriving timid people from partaking’ 
of one of the. moit agreeable parties of 
pleafure (independent of a little fatigue), 
that the tour of Naples affords, and one of 
the fublimeft fights in the world. Being, 
Sir, your's, &c. G.C. 
P.S, The fubftances we collegted, which 
were recently ftruck off duringéthe defcent of 
the ftones, were evidently much aéted en by 
the fire, and both hot and wet with {alt- 
water. I ftaid long enough to make three 
drawingse-of the crater, fofs, and inner 
crater. 
Bo . J y 
- For the Monthly Magaziue. 
A DESCRIPTION and HISTORICAL At-~ 
COUNT of the ANCIENT CASTLE of 
DUNNOTTER. 
N the caftern coat of Scotland, at 
the diftance of two miles from Ston- 
haven, the county town of Kincardine- 
fhire, fand the ruins of the Cattle of Dun~ 
notter. This place, which was formerly 
almoft impregnable, and made a very con- 
fiderable figure inthe rade wars of former 
ages, ftill prefents an intercfting appear- 
ance to the eye of the traveller. The 
lofty and abrupt rack on which it ftands is 
almoft furrounded by the fea; and the 
nayew paflage which forms its only con- 
- nection 
