The existing state of affairs during these few waiting days is so

graphically given in a letter from Mrs. Thomas T. Prentis, wife of the

United States Consul at St. Pierre, to her sister in Melrose, a suburban

city of Boston, that we quote it here:

“My Dear Sister: This morning the whole population of the city is on the

alert and every eye is directed toward Mont Pelee, an extinct volcano.

Everybody is afraid that the volcano has taken into its heart to burst

forth and destroy the whole island.

“Fifty years ago Mont Pelee burst forth with terrific force and

destroyed everything within a radius of several miles. For several days

the mountain has been bursting forth in flame and immense quantities of

lava are flowing down its sides.

“All the inhabitants are going up to see it. There is not a horse to

be had on the island, those belonging to the natives being kept in

readiness to leave at a moment’s notice.

“Last Wednesday, which was April 23d, I was in my room with little

Christine, and we heard three distinct shocks. They were so great that

we supposed at first that there was some one at the door, and Christine

went and found no one there. The first report was very loud, and the

second and third were so great that dishes were thrown from the shelves

and the house was rocked.

“We can see Mont Pelee from the rear windows of our house, and although

it is fully four miles away, we can hear the roar of the fire and lava

issuing from it.

“The city is covered with ashes and clouds of smoke have been over our

heads for the last five days. The smell of sulphur is so strong that

horses on the streets stop and snort, and some of them are obliged to

give up, drop in their harness and die from suffocation. Many of the

people are obliged to wear wet handkerchiefs over their faces to protect

them from the fumes of sulphur.

“My husband assures me that there is no immediate danger, and when there

is the least particle of danger we will leave the place. There is an

American schooner, the R. F. Morse, in the harbor, and she will remain

here for at least two weeks. If the volcano becomes very bad we shall

embark at once and go out to sea. The papers in this city are asking

if we are going to experience another earthquake similar to that which

struck here some fifty years ago.”

THE FATEFUL EIGHTH OF MAY

The writer of this letter and her husband, Consul Prentis, trusted Mont

Pelee too long. They perished, with all the inhabitants of the city, in

a deadly flood of fire and ashes that descended on the devoted place

on the fateful morning of Thursday, May 8th. Only for the few who were

rescued from the ships in the harbor there would be scarcely a living

soul to tell that dread story of ruin and death. The most graphic

accounts are those given by rescued officers of the Roraima, one of the

fleet of the Quebec Steamship Co., trading with the West Indies. This

vessel had left the Island of Dominica for Martinique at midnight of

Wednesday, and reached St. Pierre about 7 o’clock Thursday morning. The

greatest difficulty was experienced in getting into port, the air being

thick with falling ashes and the darkness intense. The ship had to

grope its way to the anchorage. Appalling sounds were issuing from the

mountain behind the town, which was shrouded in darkness. The ashes were

falling thickly on the steamer’s deck, where the passengers and others

were gazing at the town, some being engaged in photographing the scene.

The best way in which we can describe a scene of which few lived to tell

the story, is to give the narratives of a number of the survivors.

From their several stories a coherent idea of the terrible scene can

be formed. From the various accounts given of the terrible explosion

by officers of the Roraima, we select as a first example the following

description by Assistant Purser Thompson:

A TALE OF SUDDEN RUIN

“I saw St. Pierre destroyed. It was blotted out by one great flash of

fire. Nearly 40,000 persons were all killed at once. Out of eighteen

vessels lying in the roads only one, the British steamship Roddam,

escaped, and she, I hear, lost more than half on board. It was a dying

crew that took her out.

“Our boat, the Roraima, of the Quebec Line, arrived at St. Pierre early

Thursday morning. For hours before we entered the roadstead we could see

flames and smoke rising from Mont Pelee. No one on board had any idea

of danger. Captain G. T. Muggah was on the bridge, and all hands got on

deck to see the show.

“The spectacle was magnificent. As we approached St. Pierre we could

distinguish the rolling and leaping of the red flames that belched from

the mountain in huge volumes and gushed high in to the sky. Enormous

clouds of black smoke hung over the volcano.

“When we anchored at St. Pierre I noticed the cable steamship Grappler,

the Roddam, three or four American schooners and a number of Italian and

Norwegian barks. The flames were then spurting straight up in the air,

now and then waving to one side or the other for a moment and again

leaping suddenly higher up.

“There was a constant muffled roar. It was like the biggest oil refinery

in the world burning up on the mountain top. There was a tremendous

explosion about 7.45 o’clock, soon after we got in. The mountain was

blown to pieces. There was no warning. The side of the volcano was

ripped out, and there was hurled straight toward us a solid wall of

flame. It sounded like thousands of cannon.

“The wave of fire was on us and over us like a lightning flash. It was

like a hurricane of fire. I saw it strike the cable steamship Grappler

broadside on and capsize her. From end to end she burst into flames and

then sank. The fire rolled in mass straight down upon St. Pierre and the

shipping. The town vanished before our eyes and the air grew stifling

hot, and we were in the thick of it.

“Wherever the mass of fire struck the sea the water boiled and sent

up vast clouds of steam. The sea was torn into huge whirlpools that

careened toward the open sea.

“One of these horrible hot whirlpools swung under the Roraima and pulled

her down on her beam ends with the suction. She careened way over to

port, and then the fire hurricane from the volcano smashed her, and over

she went on the opposite side. The fire wave swept off the masts and

smokestack as if they were cut with a knife.

HEAT CAUSED EXPLOSIONS

“Captain Muggah was the only one on deck not killed outright. He was

caught by the fire wave and terribly burned. He yelled to get up the

anchor, but, before two fathoms were heaved in the Roraima was almost

upset by the boiling whirlpool, and the fire wave had thrown her down on

her beam ends to starboard. Captain Muggah was overcome by the flames.

He fell unconscious from the bridge and toppled overboard.

“The blast of fire from the volcano lasted only a few minutes. It

shriveled and set fire to everything it touched. Thousands of casks of

rum were stored in St. Pierre, and these were exploded by the terrific

heat. The burning rum ran in streams down every street and out to the

sea. This blazing rum set fire to the Roraima several times. Before the

volcano burst the landings of St. Pierre were crowded with people. After

the explosion not one living being was seen on land. Only twenty-five of

those on the Roraima out of sixty-eight were left after the first flash.

“The French cruiser Suchet came in and took us off at 2 P. M. She

remained nearby, helping all she could, until 5 o’clock, then went to

Fort de France with all the people she had rescued. At that time it

looked as if the entire north end of the island was on fire.”

C. C. Evans, of Montreal, and John G. Morris, of New York, who were

among those rescued, say the vessel arrived at 6 o’clock. As eight bells

were struck a frightful explosion was heard up the mountain. A cloud of

fire, toppling and roaring, swept with lightning speed down the mountain

side and over the town and bay. The Roraima was nearly sunk, and caught

fire at once.

“I can never forget the horrid, fiery, choking whirlwind which enveloped

me,” said Mr. Evans. “Mr. Morris and I rushed below. We are not very

badly burned, not so bad as most of them. When the fire came we were

going to our posts (we are engineers) to weigh anchor and get out. When

we came up we found the ship afire aft, and fought it forward until 3

o’clock, when the Suchet came to our rescue. We were then building a

raft.”

“Ben” Benson, the carpenter of the Roraima, said: “I was on deck,

amidships, when I heard an explosion. The captain ordered me to up

anchor. I got to the windlass, but when the fire came I went into the

forecastle and got my ‘duds.’ When I came out I talked with Captain

Muggah, Mr. Scott, the first officer and others. They had been on the

bridge. The captain was horribly burned. He had inhaled flames and

wanted to jump into the sea. I tried to make him take a life-preserver.

The captain, who was undressed, jumped overboard and hung on to a line

for a while. Then he disappeared.”

THE COOPER’S STORY.

James Taylor, a cooper employed on the Roraima, gives the following

account of his experience of the disaster:

“Hearing a tremendous report and seeing the ashes falling thicker, I

dived into a room, dragging with me Samuel Thomas, a gangway man and

fellow countryman, shutting the door tightly. Shortly after I heard a

voice, which I recognized as that of the chief mate, Mr. Scott. Opening

the door with great caution, I drew him in. The nose of Thomas was

burned by the intense heat.

“We three and Thompson, the assistant purser, out of sixty-eight souls

on board, were the only persons who escaped practically uninjured. The

heat being unbearable, I emerged in a few moments, and the scene that

presented itself to my eyes baffles description. All around on the deck

were the dead and dying covered with boiling mud. There they lay, men,

women and little children, and the appeals of the latter for water were

heart-rending. When water was given them they could not swallow it,

owing to their throats being filled with ashes or burnt with the heated

air.

“The ship was burning aft, and I jumped overboard, the sea being

intensely hot. I was at once swept seaward by a tidal wave, but, the sea

receding a considerable distance, the return wave washed me against an

upturned sloop to which I clung. I was joined by a man so dreadfully

burned and disfigured as to be unrecognizable. Afterwards I found he was

the captain of the Roraima, Captain Muggah. He was in dreadful agony,

begging piteously to be put on board his ship.

“Picking up some wreckage which contained bedding and a tool chest, I,

with the help of five others who had joined me on the wreck, constructed

a rude raft, on which we placed the captain. Then, seeing an upturned

boat, I asked one of the five, a native of Martinique, to swim and fetch

it. Instead of returning to us, he picked up two of his countrymen and

went away in the direction of Fort de France. Seeing the Roddam, which

arrived in port shortly after we anchored, making for the Roraima, I

said good-bye to the captain and swam back to the Roraima.

“The Roddam, however, burst into flames and put to sea. I reached the

Roraima at about half-past 2, and was afterwards taken off by a boat

from the French warship Suchet. Twenty-four others with myself were

taken on to Fort de France. Three of these died before reaching port. A

number of others have since died.”

Samuel Thomas, the gangway man, whose life was saved by the forethought

of Taylor, says that the scene on the burning ship was awful. The groans

and cries of the dying, for whom nothing could be done, were horrible.

He describes a woman as being burned to death with a living babe in her

arms. He says that it seemed as if the whole world was afire.

CONSUL AYME’S STATEMENT

The inflammable material in the forepart of the ship that would have

ignited that part of the vessel was thrown overboard by him and the

other two uninjured men. The Grappler, the telegraph company’s ship,

was seen opposite the Usine Guerin, and disappeared as if blown up by a

submarine explosion. The captain’s body was subsequently found by a boat

from the Suchet.

Consul Ayme, of Guadeloupe, who, as already stated, had hastened to

Fort de France on hearing of the terrible event, tells the story of the

disaster in the following words:

“Thursday morning the inhabitants of the city awoke to find heavy clouds

shrouding Mont Pelee crater. All day Wednesday horrid detonations had

been heard. These were echoed from St. Thomas on the north to Barbados

on the south. The cannonading ceased on Wednesday night, and fine ashes

fell like rain on St. Pierre. The inhabitants were alarmed, but

Governor Mouttet, who had arrived at St. Pierre the evening before, did

everything possible to allay the panic.

“The British steamer Roraima reached St. Pierre on Thursday with ten

passengers, among whom were Mrs. Stokes and her three children, and Mrs.

H. J. Ince. They were watching the rain of ashes, when, with a frightful

roar and terrific electric discharges, a cyclone of fire, mud and steam

swept down from the crater over the town and bay, sweeping all before it

and destroying the fleet of vessels at anchor off the shore. There the

accounts of the catastrophe so far obtainable cease. Thirty thousand

corpses are strewn about, buried in the ruins of St. Pierre, or else

floating, gnawed by sharks, in the surrounding seas. Twenty-eight

charred, half-dead human beings were brought here. Sixteen of them

are already dead, and only four of the whole number are expected to

recover.”

A WOMAN’S EXPERIENCE ON THE “RORAIMA”

Margaret Stokes, the 9 year old daughter of the late Clement Stokes,

of New York, who, with her mother, a brother aged 4 and a sister aged 3

years, was on the ill-fated steamer Roraima, was saved from that vessel,

but is not expected to live. Her nurse, Clara King, tells the following

story of her experience:

She says she was in her stateroom, when the steward of the Roraima

called out to her:

“Look at Mont Pelee.”

She went on deck and saw a vast mass of black cloud coming down from the

volcano. The steward ordered her to return to the saloon, saying, “It is

coming.”

Miss King then rushed to the saloon. She says she experienced a feeling

of suffocation, which was followed by intense heat. The afterpart of the

Roraima broke out in flames. Ben Benson, the carpenter of the Roraima,

severely burned, assisted Miss King and Margaret Stokes to escape. With

the help of Mr. Scott, the first mate of the Roraima, he constructed

a raft, with life preservers. Upon this Miss King and Margaret were

placed.

While this was being done Margaret’s little brother died. Mate Scott

brought the child water at great personal danger, but it was unavailing.

Shortly after the death of the little boy Mrs. Stokes succumbed.

Margaret and Miss King eventually got away on the raft, and were picked

up by the steamer Korona. Mate Scott also escaped. Miss King did not

sustain serious injuries. She covered the face of Margaret with her

dress, but still the child was probably fatally burned.

The only woman known at that time to have survived the disaster at St.

Pierre was a negress named Fillotte. She was found in a cellar Saturday

afternoon, where she had been for three days. She was still alive, but

fearfully burned from head to toes. She died afterward in the hospital.

CAPTAIN FREEMAN’S THRILLING ACCOUNT

Of the vessels in the harbor of St. Pierre on the fateful morning, only

one, the British steamer Roddam, escaped, and that with a crew of whom

few reached the open sea alive. Those who did escape were terribly

injured. Captain Freeman, of this vessel, tells what he experienced in

the following thrilling language:

“St. Lucia, British West Indies, May 11.--The steamer Roddam, of which I

am captain, left St. Lucia at midnight of May 7, and was off St. Pierre,

Martinique, at 6 o’clock on the morning of the 8th. I noticed that the

volcano, Mont Pelee, was smoking, and crept slowly in toward the bay,

finding there among others the steamer Roraima, the telegraph repairing

steamer Grappler and four sailing vessels. I went to anchorage between 7

and 8 and had hardly moored when the side of the volcano opened out with

a terrible explosion. A wall of fire swept over the town and the bay.

The Roddam was struck broadside by the burning mass. The shock to the

ship was terrible, nearly capsizing her.

AWFUL RESULTS

“Hearing the awful report of the explosion and seeing the great wall of

flames approaching the steamer, those on deck sought shelter wherever it

was possible, jumping into the cabin, the forecastle and even into the

hold. I was in the chart room, but the burning embers were borne by so

swift a movement of the air that they were swept in through the door and

port holes, suffocating and scorching me badly. I was terribly burned

by these embers about the face and hands, but managed to reach the

deck. Then, as soon as it was possible, I mustered the few survivors

who seemed able to move, ordered them to slip the anchor, leaped for

the bridge and ran the engine for full speed astern. The second and the

third engineer and a fireman were on watch below and so escaped injury.

They did their part in the attempt to escape, but the men on deck could

not work the steering gear because it was jammed by the debris from the

volcano. We accordingly went ahead and astern until the gear was free,

but in this running backward and forward it was two hours after the

first shock before we were clear of the bay.

“One of the most terrifying conditions was that, the atmosphere

being charged with ashes, it was totally dark. The sun was completely

obscured, and the air was only illuminated by the flames from the

volcano and those of the burning town and shipping. It seems small to

say that the scene was terrifying in the extreme. As we backed out we

passed close to the Roraima, which was one mass of blaze. The steam was

rushing from the engine room, and the screams of those on board were

terrible to hear. The cries for help were all in vain, for I could

do nothing but save my own ship. When I last saw the Roraima she was

settling down by the stern. That was about 10 o’clock in the morning.

“When the Roddam was safely out of the harbor of St. Pierre, with its

desolations and horrors, I made for St. Lucia. Arriving there, and when

the ship was safe, I mustered the survivors as well as I was able and

searched for the dead and injured. Some I found in the saloon where they

had vainly sought for safety, but the cabins were full of burning embers

that had blown in through the port holes. Through these the fire swept

as through funnels and burned the victims where they lay or stood,

leaving a circular imprint of scorched and burned flesh. I brought

ten on deck who were thus burned; two of them were dead, the others

survived, although in a dreadful state of torture from their burns.

Their screams of agony were heartrending. Out of a total of twenty-three

on board the Roddam, which includes the captain and the crew, ten are

dead and several are in the hospital. My first and second mates, my

chief engineer and my supercargo, Campbell by name, were killed. The

ship was covered from stem to stern with tons of powdered lava, which

retained its heat for hours after it had fallen. In many cases it was

practically incandescent, and to move about the deck in this burning

mass was not only difficult but absolutely perilous. I am only now able

to begin thoroughly to clear and search the ship for any damage done

by this volcanic rain, and to see if there are any corpses in

out-of-the-way places. For instance, this morning, I found one body in

the peak of the forecastle. The body was horribly burned and the sailor

had evidently crept in there in his agony to die.

“On the arrival of the Roddam at St. Lucia the ship presented an

appalling appearance. Dead and calcined bodies lay about the deck, which

was also crowded with injured helpless and suffering people. Prompt

assistance was rendered to the injured by the authorities here and my

poor, tortured men were taken to the hospital. The dead were buried.

I have omitted to mention that out of twenty-one black laborers that I

brought from Grenada to help in stevedoring, only six survived. Most

of the others threw themselves overboard to escape a dreadful fate, but

they met a worse one, for it is an actual fact that the water around

the ship was literally at a boiling heat. The escape of my vessel

was miraculous. The woodwork of the cabins and bridge and everything

inflammable on deck were constantly igniting, and it was with great

difficulty that we few survivors managed to keep the flames down. My

ropes, awnings, tarpaulins were completely burned up.

“I witnessed the entire destruction of St. Pierre. The flames enveloped

the town in every quarter with such rapidity that it was impossible that

any person could be saved. As I have said, the day was suddenly turned

to night, but I could distinguish by the light of the burning town

people distractedly running about on the beach. The burning buildings

stood out from the surrounding darkness like black shadows. All this

time the mountain was roaring and shaking, and in the intervals between

these terrifying sounds I could hear the cries of despair and agony from

the thousands who were perishing. These cries added to the terror of

the scene, but it is impossible to describe its horror or the dreadful

sensations it produced. It was like witnessing the end of the world.

“Let me add that, after the first shock was over, the survivors of

the crew rendered willing help to navigate the ship to this port. Mr.

Plissoneau, our agent in Martinique, happening to be on board, was

saved, and I really believe that he is the only survivor of St. Pierre.

As it is, he is seriously burned on the hands and face.

“FREEMAN,

“Master British Steamship Roddam.”

THE “ETONA” PASSES ST. PIERRE

The British steamer Etona, of the Norton Line, stopped at St. Lucia to

coal on May 10th. Captain Cantell there visited the Roddam and had an

interview with Captain Freeman. On the 11th the Elona put to sea again,

passing St. Pierre in the afternoon. We subjoin her captain’s story:

“The weather was clear and we had a fine view, but the old outlines of

St. Pierre were not recognizable. Everything was a mass of blue lava,

and the formation of the land itself seemed to have changed. When we

were about eight miles off the northern end of the island Mount Pelee

began to belch a second time. Clouds of smoke and lava shot into the

air and spread over all the sea, darkening the sun. Our decks in a

few minutes were covered with a substance that looked like sand dyed a

bluish tint, and which smelled like phosphorus. For all that the day was

clear, there was little to be seen satisfactorily. Over the island there

hung a blue haze. It seemed to me that the formation, the topography, of

the island was altered.

“Everything seemed to be covered with a blue dust, such as had fallen

aboard us every day since we had been within the affected region. It

was blue lava dust. For more than an hour we scanned the coast with our

glasses, now and then discovering something that looked like a ruined

hamlet or collection of buildings. There was no life visible. Suddenly

we realized that we might have to fight for our lives as the Roddam’s

people had done.

“We were about four miles off the northern end of the island when

suddenly there shot up in the air to a tremendous height a column of

smoke. The sky darkened and the smoke seemed to swirl down upon us. In

fact, it spread all around, darkening the atmosphere as far as we could

see. I called Chief Engineer Farrish to the deck.

“‘Do you see that over there?’ I asked, pointing to the eruption, for

it was the second eruption of Mont Pelee. He saw it all right. Captain

Freeman’s story was fresh in my mind.

“‘Well, Farrish, rush your engines as they have never been rushed

before,’ I said to him. He went below, and soon we began to burn coal

and pile up the feathers in our forefoot.

“I was on watch with Second Officer Gibbs. At once we began to furl

awnings and make secure against fire. The crew were all showing an

anxious spirit, and everybody on board, including the four passengers,

were serious and apprehensive.

“We began to cut through the water at almost twelve knots. Ordinarily we

make ten knots. We could see no more of the land contour, but everything

seemed to be enveloped in a great cloud. There was no fire visible, but

the lava dust rained down upon us steadily. In less than an hour there

were two inches of it upon our deck.

“The air smelled like phosphorus. No one dared to look up to try to

locate the sun, because one’s eyes would fill with lava dust. Some of

the blue lava dust is sticking to our mast yet, although we have swabbed

decks and rigging again and again to be clear of it.

“After a little more than an hour’s fast running we saw daylight ahead

and began to breathe easier. If I had not talked with Captain Freeman

and heard from him just how the black swirl of wind and fire rolled down

upon him, I would not have been so apprehensive, but would have thought

that the darkness and cloud that came down upon us meant just an

unusually heavy squall.”

CHIEF ENGINEER FARRISH’S STORY

“The Etona’s run from Montevideo was a fast one--I think a record

breaker. We were 22 days and 21 hours from port to port. Off Martinique

I stared at the coast for about an hour, and then went below. The blue

lava that covered everything faded into the haze that hung over the

island so that nothing was distinctly visible. Through my glass I

discovered a stream of lava, though. It stretched down the mountain

side, and seemed to be flowing into the sea. It was not clearly and

distinctly visible, however.

“About 3 o’clock I went below to take forty winks. I had been in my

berth only a few minutes when the steward told me the captain wanted me

on the bridge.

“‘Do you see that, Farrish?’ he asked, pointing at the land. An outburst

of smoke seemed to be sweeping down upon us. It made me think of the

Roddam’s experience. Smoke and dust closed in about us, shutting out the

sunlight, and precipitating a fall of lava on our decks.

“‘Go below and drive her,’ said the captain, and I didn’t lose any time,

I can tell you. We burned coal as though it didn’t cost a cent. The

safety valve was jumping every second, even though we were making twelve

knots an hour. For two hours we kept up the pace, and then, running into

clear daylight, let the engines slow down and we all cheered up a bit.”

CAPTAIN CANTELL VISITS THE “RODDAM”

Captain Cantell went on board the Roddam, whose frightful condition he

thus describes:

“At St. Lucia, on May 11th, I went on board the British steamship

Roddam, which had escaped from the terrible volcanic eruption at

Martinique two days before. The state of the ship was enough to show

that those on board must have undergone an awful experience.

“The Roddam was covered with a mass of fine bluish gray dust or ashes of

cement-like appearance. In some parts it lay two feet deep on the decks.

This matter had fallen in a red-hot state all over the steamer, setting

fire to everything it struck that was burnable, and, when it fell on

the men on board, burning off limbs and large pieces of flesh. This was

shown by finding portions of human flesh when the decks were cleared of

the debris. The rigging, ropes, tarpaulins, sails, awnings, etc., were

charred or burned, and most of the upper stanchions and spars were swept

overboard or destroyed by fire. Skylights were smashed and cabins were

filled with volcanic dust. The scene of ruin was deplorable.

“The captain, though suffering the greatest agony, succeeded in

navigating his vessel safely to the port of Castries, St. Lucia, with

eighteen dead bodies on the deck and human limbs scattered about. A

sailor stood by constantly wiping the captain’s injured eyes.

“I think the performance of the Roddam’s captain was most wonderful, and

the more so when I saw his pitiful condition. I do not understand how

he kept up, yet when the steamer arrived at St. Lucia and medical

assistance was procured, this brave man asked the doctors to attend to

the others first and refused to be treated until this was done.

“My interview with the captain brought out this account. I left him in

good spirits and receiving every comfort. The sight of his face would

frighten anyone not prepared to see it.”

THE VIVID ACCOUNT OF M. ALBERT

To the accounts given by the survivors of the Roraima and the officers

of the Etona, it will be well to add the following graphic story told by

M. Albert, a planter of the island, the owner of an estate situated only

a mile to the northeast of the burning crater of Mont Pelee. His escape

from death had in it something of the marvellous. He says:

“Mont Pelee had given warning of the destruction that was to come, but

we, who had looked upon the volcano as harmless, did not believe that

it would do more than spout fire and steam, as it had done on other

occasions. It was a little before eight o’clock on the morning of May

8 that the end came. I was in one of the fields of my estate when the

ground trembled under my feet, not as it does when the earth quakes, but

as though a terrible struggle was going on within the mountain. A terror

came upon me, but I could not explain my fear.

“As I stood still Mont Pelee seemed to shudder, and a moaning sound

issued from its crater. It was quite dark, the sun being obscured by

ashes and fine volcanic dust. The air was dead about me, so dead that

the floating dust seemingly was not disturbed. Then there was a rending,

crashing, grinding noise, which I can only describe as sounding as

though every bit of machinery in the world had suddenly broken down. It

was deafening, and the flash of light that accompanied it was blinding,

more so than any lightning I have ever seen.

“It was like a terrible hurricane, and where a fraction of a second

before there had been a perfect calm, I felt myself drawn into a vortex

and I had to brace myself firmly. It was like a great express train

rushing by, and I was drawn by its force. The mysterious force levelled

a row of strong trees, tearing them up by the roots and leaving bare a

space of ground fifteen yards wide and more than one hundred yards long.

Transfixed I stood, not knowing in what direction to flee. I looked

toward Mont Pelee, and above its apex there appeared a great black cloud

which reached high in the air. It literally fell upon the city of St.

Pierre. It moved with a rapidity that made it impossible for anything to

escape it. From the cloud came explosions that sounded as though all of

the navies of the world were in titanic combat. Lightning played in and

out in broad forks, the result being that intense darkness was followed

by light that seemed to be of magnifying power.

“That St. Pierre was doomed I knew, but I was prevented from seeing the

destruction by a spur of the hill that shut off the view of the city. It

is impossible for me to tell how long I stood there inert. Probably it

was only a few seconds, but so vivid were my impressions that it

now seems as though I stood as a spectator for many minutes. When I

recovered possession of my senses I ran to my house and collected the

members of the family, all of whom were panic stricken. I hurried them

to the seashore, where we boarded a small steamship, in which we made

the trip in safety to Fort de France.

“I know that there was no flame in the first wave that was sent down

upon St. Pierre. It was a heavy gas, like firedamp, and it must have

asphyxiated the inhabitants before they were touched by the fire, which

quickly followed. As we drew out to sea in the small steamship, Mont

Pelee was in the throes of a terrible convulsion. New craters seemed to

be opening all about the summit and lava was flowing in broad streams

in every direction. My estate was ruined while we were still in sight

of it. Many women who lived in St. Pierre escaped only to know that they

were left widowed and childless. This is because many of the wealthier

men sent their wives away, while they remained in St. Pierre to attend

to their business affairs.”

WHAT HAPPENED ON THE “HORACE”

The British steamer Horace experienced the effect of the explosion when

farther from land. After touching at Barbados, she reached the vicinity

of Martinique on May 9th, her decks being covered with several inches

of dust when she was a hundred and twenty-five miles distant. We quote

engineer Anderson’s story:

“On the afternoon of May 8 (Thursday) we noticed a peculiar haze in

the direction of Martinique. The air seemed heavy and oppressive. The

weather conditions were not at all unlike those which precede the great

West Indian hurricanes, but, knowing it was not the season of the year

for them, we all remarked in the engine room that there must be a heavy

storm approaching.

“Several of the sailors, experienced deep water seamen, laughed at our

prognostications, and informed us there would be no storm within

the next sixty hours, and insisted that, according to all fo’cas’le

indications, a dead calm was in sight.

“So unusually peculiar were the weather conditions that we talked

of nothing else during the evening. That night, in the direction of

Martinique, there was a very black sky, an unusual thing at this season

of the year, and a storm was apparently brewing in a direction from

which storms do not come at this season.

GREAT FLASHES OF LIGHT

“As the night wore on those on watch noticed what appeared to be great

flashes of lightning in the direction of Martinique. It seemed as though

the ordinary conditions were reversed, and even the fo’cas’le prophets

were unable to offer explanations.

“Occasionally, over the pounding of the engines and the rush of water,

we thought we could hear long, deep roars, not unlike the ending of a

deep peal of thunder. Several times we heard the rumble or roar, but at

the time we were not certain as to exactly what it was, or even whether

we really heard it.

“There would suddenly come great flashes of light from the dark bank

toward Martinique. Some of them seemed to spread over a great area,

while others appeared to spout skyward, funnel shaped. All night this

continued, and it was not until day came that the flashes disappeared.

The dark bank that covered the horizon toward Martinique, however, did

not fade away with the breaking of day, and at eight in the morning of

the 9th (Friday) the whole section of the sky in that direction seemed

dark and troubled.

“About nine o’clock Friday morning I was sitting on one of the

hatches aft with some of the other engineers and officers of the ship,

discussing the peculiar weather phenomena. I noticed a sort of grit that

got into my mouth from the end of the cigar I was smoking.

“I attributed it to some rather bad coal which we had shipped aboard,

and, turning to Chief Engineer Evans, I remarked that ‘that coal was

mighty dirty,’ and he said that it was covering the ship with a sort of

grit. Then I noticed that grit was getting on my clothes, and finally

some one suggested that we go forward of the funnels, so we would not

get dirt on us. As we went forward we met one or two of the sailors from

the forecastle, who wanted to know about the dust that was falling on

the ship. Then we found that the grayish-looking ash was sifting all

over the ship, both forward and aft.

ASHES RAINED ON THE SHIP

“Every moment the ashes rained down all over the ship, and at the same

time grew thicker. A few moments later, the lookout called down that we

were running into a fog-bank dead ahead. Fog banks in that section are

unheard of at nine o’clock in the morning at this season, and we were

more than a hundred miles from land, and what could fog and sand be

doing there.

“Before we knew it, we went into the fog, which proved to be a big

dense bank of this same sand, and it rained down on us from every side.

Ventilators were quickly brought to their places, and later even the

hatches were battened down. The dust became suffocating, and the men at

times had all they could do to keep from choking. What the stuff was we

could not at first conjecture, or rather, we didn’t have much time to

speculate on it, for we had to get our ship in shape to withstand we

hardly knew what.

“At first we thought that the sand must have been blown from shore. Then

we decided that if the Captain’s figures were right we wouldn’t be near

enough to shore to have sand blow on us, and as we had just cleared

Barbados, we knew that the Captain’s figures had to be right.

“Just as the storm of sand was at its height, Fourth Engineer Wild was

nearly suffocated by it, but was easily revived. About this time it

became so dark that we found it necessary to start up the electric

lights, and it was not until after we got clear from the fog that

we turned the current off. In the meantime they had burned from nine

o’clock in the morning until after two in the afternoon.

THE ENGINE BECAME CHOKED

“Then there was another anxious moment shortly after nine o’clock. Third

Engineer Rennie had been running the donkey engine, when suddenly it

choked, and when he finally got it clear from the sand or ashes, he

found the valves were all cut out, and then it was we discovered that

it was not sand, but some sort of a composition that seemed to cut steel

like emery. Then came the danger that it would get into the valves of

the engine and cut them out, and for several moments all hands scurried

about and helped make the engine room tight, and even then the ash

drifted in and kept all the engine room force wiping the engines clear

of it.

“Toward three o’clock in the afternoon of Friday we were practically

clear of the sand, but at eleven o’clock that night we ran into a second

bank of it, though not as bad as the first. We made some experiments,

and found the stuff was superior to emery dust. It cut deeper and

quicker, and only about half as much was required to do the work. We

made up our minds we would keep what came on board, as it was better

than the emery dust and much cheaper, so we gathered it up.

“That night there were more of the same electric phenomena toward

Martinique, but it was not until we got into St. Lucia, where we saw the

Roddam, that we learned of the terrible disaster at St. Pierre, and then

we knew that our sand was lava dust.”

The volcanic ash which fell on the decks of the Horace was ground as

fine as rifle powder, and was much finer than that which covered the

decks of the Etona.

Returning to the stories told by officers of the Roraima, of which a

number have been given, it seems desirable to add here the narrative of

Ellery S. Scott, the mate of the ruined ship, since it gives a vivid and

striking account of his personal experience of the frightful disaster,

with many details of interest not related by others.

MATE SCOTT’S GRAPHIC STORY

“We got to St. Pierre in the Roraima,” began Mr. Scott, “at 6.30 o’clock

on Thursday morning. That’s the morning the mountain and the town and

the ships were all sent to hell in a minute.

“All hands had had breakfast. I was standing on the fo’c’s’l head trying

to make out the marks on the pipes of a ship ‘way out and heading for

St. Lucia. I wasn’t looking at the mountain at all. But I guess the

captain was, for he was on the bridge, and the last time I heard him

speak was when he shouted, ‘Heave up, Mr. Scott; heave up.’ I gave the

order to the men, and I think some of them did jump to get the anchor

up, but nobody knows what really happened for the next fifteen minutes.

I turned around toward the captain and then I saw the mountain.

“Did you ever see the tide come into the Bay of Fundy. It doesn’t sneak

in a little at a time as it does ‘round here. It rolls in in waves.

That’s the way the cloud of fire and mud and white-hot stones rolled

down from that volcano over the town and over the ships. It was on us

in almost no time, but I saw it and in the same glance I saw our captain

bracing himself to meet it on the bridge. He was facing the fire cloud

with both hands gripped hard to the bridge rail, his legs apart and his

knees braced back stiff. I’ve seen him brace himself that same way many

a time in a tough sea with the spray going mast-head high and green

water pouring along the decks.

“I saw the captain, I say, at the same instant I saw that ruin coming

down on us. I don’t know why, but that last glimpse of poor Muggah on

his bridge will stay with me just as long as I remember St. Pierre and

that will be long enough.

“In another instant it was all over for him. As I was looking at him he

was all ablaze. He reeled and fell on the bridge with his face toward

me. His mustache and eyebrows were gone in a jiffy. His hat had gone,

and his hair was aflame, and so were his clothes from head to foot.

I knew he was conscious when he fell, by the look in his eyes, but he

didn’t make a sound.

“That all happened a long way inside of half a minute; then something

new happened. When the wave of fire was going over us, a tidal wave of

the sea came out from the shore and did the rest. That wall of rushing

water was so high and so solid that it seemed to rise up and join the

smoke and flame above. For an instant we could see nothing but the water

and the flame.

“That tidal wave picked the ship up like a canoe and then smashed her.

After one list to starboard the ship righted, but the masts, the bridge,

the funnel and all the upper works had gone overboard.

“I had saved myself from fire by jamming a metal ventilator cover over

my head and jumping from the fo’c’s’l head. Two St. Kitts negroes saved

me from the water by grabbing me by the legs and pulling me down into

the fo’c’s’l after them. Before I could get up three men tumbled in on

top of me. Two of them were dead.

“Captain Muggah went overboard, still clinging to the fragments of his

wrecked bridge. Daniel Taylor, the ship’s cooper, and a Kitts native

jumped overboard to save him. Taylor managed to push the captain on to

a hatch that had floated off from us and then they swam back to the ship

for more assistance, but nothing could be done for the captain. Taylor

wasn’t sure he was alive. The last we saw of him or his dead body it was

drifting shoreward on that hatch.

“Well, after staying in the fo’c’s’l about twenty minutes I went out on

deck. There were just four of us left aboard who could do anything.

The four were Thompson, Dan Taylor, Quashee, and myself. It was still

raining fire and hot rocks and you could hardly see a ship’s length for

dust and ashes, but we could stand that. There were burning men and some

women and two or three children lying around the deck. Not just burned,

but burning, then, when we got to them. More than half the ship’s

company had been killed in that first rush of flame. Some had rolled

overboard when the tidal wave came and we never saw so much as their

bodies. The cook was burned to death in his galley. He had been paring

potatoes for dinner and what was left of his right hand held the shank

of his potato knife. The wooden handle was in ashes. All that happened

to a man in less than a minute. The donkey engineman was killed on deck

sitting in front of his boiler. We found parts of some bodies--a hand,

or an arm or a leg. Below decks there were some twenty alive.

“The ship was on fire, of course, what was left of it. The stumps of

both masts were blazing. Aft she was like a furnace, but forward the

flames had not got below deck, so we four carried those who were still

alive on deck into the fo’c’s’l. All of them were burned and most of

them were half strangled.

“One boy, a passenger and just a little shaver [the four-year-old son of

the late Clement Stokes, above spoken of] was picked up naked. His hair

and all his clothing had been burned off, but he was alive. We rolled

him in a blanket and put him in a sailor’s bunk. A few minutes later we

looked at him and he was dead.

“My own son’s gone, too. It had been his trick at lookout ahead during

the dog watch that morning, when we were making for St. Pierre, so I

supposed at first when the fire struck us that he was asleep in his bunk

and safe. But he wasn’t. Nobody could tell me where he was. I don’t know

whether he was burned to death or rolled overboard and drowned. He was

a likely boy. He had been several voyages with me and would have been a

master some day. He used to say he’d make me mate.

“After getting all hands that had any life left in them below and

‘tended to the best we could, the four of us that were left half way

ship-shape started in to fight the fire. We had case oil stowed forward.

Thanks to that tidal wave that cleared our decks there wasn’t much left

to burn, so we got the fire down so’s we could live on board with it for

several hours more and then the four turned to to knock a raft together

out of what timber and truck we could find below. Our boats had gone

overboard with the masts and funnel.

PREPARED TO TRUST TO LUCK

“We made that raft for something over thirty that were alive. We put

provisions on for two days and rigged up a make-shift mast and sail,

for we intended to go to sea. We were only three boats’ length from the

shore, but the shore was hell itself. We intended to put straight out

and trust to luck that the Korona, that was about due at St. Pierre,

would pick us up. But we did not have to risk the raft, for about 3

o’clock in the afternoon, when we were almost ready to put the raft

overboard, the Suchet came along and took us all off. We thought for a

minute just after we were wrecked that we were to get help from a ship

that passed us. We burned blue lights, but she kept on. We learned

afterward that she was the Roddam.”

Soundings made off Martinique after the explosion showed that earthquake

effects of much importance had taken place under the sea bottom, which

had been lifted in some places and had sunk in others. While deep

crevices had been formed on the land, a still greater effect had

seemingly been produced beneath the water. During the explosion the sea

withdrew several hundred feet from its shore line, and then came back

steaming with fury; this indicating a lift and fall of the ocean bed off

the isle. Soundings made subsequently near the island found in one place

a depth of 4,000 feet where before it had been only 600 feet deep. The

French Cable Company, which was at work trying to repair the cables

broken by the eruption, found the bottom of the Caribbean Sea so changed

as to render the old charts useless.

New charts will need to be made for future navigation. The changes

in sea levels were not confined to the immediate centre of volcanic

activity, but extended as far north as Porto Rico, and it was believed

that the seismic wave would be found to have altered the ocean bed round

Jamaica. Vessels plying between St. Thomas, Martinique, St. Lucia and

other islands found it necessary to heave the lead while many miles at

sea.

It is estimated that the sea had encroached from ten feet to two miles

along the coast of St. Vincent near Georgetown, and that a section on

the north of the island had dropped into the sea. Soundings showed

seven fathoms where before the eruption there were thirty-six fathoms of

water. Vessels that endeavored to approach St. Vincent toward the north

reported that it was impossible to get nearer than eight miles to

the scene of the catastrophe, and that at that distance the ocean was

seriously perturbed as from a submarine volcano, boiling and hissing

continually.

In this connection the remarkable experience reported by the officers

of the Danish steamship Nordby, on the day preceding the eruption, is of

much interest, as seeming to show great convulsions of the sea bottom

at a point several hundred miles from Martinique. The following is the

story told by Captain Eric Lillien-skjold:

THE STRANGE EXPERIENCE OF THE “NORDBY”

“On May 5th,” the captain said, “we touched at St. Michael’s for water.

We had had an easy voyage from Girgenti, in Sicily, and we wanted to

finish an easy run here. We left St. Michael’s on the same day. Nothing

worth while talking about occurred until two days afterward--Wednesday,

May 7th.

“We were plodding along slowly that day. About noon I took the bridge

to make an observation. It seemed to be hotter than ordinary. I shed my

coat and vest and got into what little shade there was. As I worked it

grew hotter and hotter. I didn’t know what to make of it. Along about

2 o’clock in the afternoon it was so hot that all hands got to talking

about it. We reckoned that something queer was coming off, but none of

us could explain what it was. You could almost see the pitch softening

in the seams.

“Then, as quick as you could toss a biscuit over its rail, the Nordby

dropped--regularly dropped--three or four feet down into the sea. No

sooner did it do this than big waves, that looked like they were coming

from all directions at once, began to smash against our sides. This was

queerer yet, because the water a minute before was as smooth as I ever

saw it. I had all hands piped on deck and we battened down everything

loose to make ready for a storm. And we got it all right--the strangest

storm you ever heard tell of.

“There was something wrong with the sun that afternoon. It grew red and

then dark red and then, about a quarter after 2, it went out of sight

altogether. The day got so dark that you couldn’t see half a ship’s

length ahead of you. We got our lamps going, and put on our oilskins,

ready for a hurricane. All of a sudden there came a sheet of lightning

that showed up the whole tumbling sea for miles and miles. We sort of

ducked, expecting an awful crash of thunder, but it didn’t come. There

was no sound except the big waves pounding against our sides. There

wasn’t a breath of wind.

“Well, sir, at that minute there began the most exciting time I’ve ever

been through, and I’ve been on every sea on the map for twenty-five

years. Every second there’d be waves 15 or 20 feet high, belting us

head-on, stern-on and broadside, all at once. We could see them coming,

for without any stop at all flash after flash of lightning was blazing

all about us.

“Something else we could see, too. Sharks! There were hundreds of them

on all sides, jumping up and down in the water. Some of them jumped

clear out of it. And sea birds! A flock of them, squawking and crying,

made for our rigging and perched there. They seemed like they were

scared to death. But the queerest part of it all was the water itself.

It was hot--not so hot that our feet could not stand it when it washed

over the deck, but hot enough to make us think that it had been heated

by some kind of a fire.

“Well that sort of thing went on hour after hour. The waves, the

lightning, the hot water and the sharks, and all the rest of the odd

things happening, frightened the crew out of their wits. Some of them

prayed out loud--I guess the first time they ever did in their lives.

Some Frenchmen aboard kept running around and yelling, ‘Cest le dernier

jour!’ (This is the last day.) We were all worried. Even the officers

began to think that the world was coming to an end. Mighty strange

things happen on the sea, but this topped them all.

“I kept to the bridge all night. When the first hour of morning came

the storm was still going on. We were all pretty much tired out by that

time, but there was no such thing as trying to sleep. The waves still

were batting us around and we didn’t know whether we were one mile or

a thousand miles from shore. At 2 o’clock in the morning all the queer

goings on stopped just the way they began--all of a sudden. We lay to

until daylight; then we took our reckonings and started off again. We

were about 700 miles off Cape Henlopen.

“No, sir; you couldn’t get me through a thing like that again for

$10,000. None of us was hurt, and the old Nordby herself pulled through

all right, but I’d sooner stay ashore than see waves without wind and

lightning without thunder.”

FIERY STREAM CONTAINED POISONOUS GASES

Careful inspection showed that the fiery stream which so completely

destroyed St. Pierre must have been composed of poisonous gases, which

instantly suffocated every one who inhaled them, and of other gases

burning furiously, for nearly all the victims had their hands covering

their mouths, or were in some other attitude showing that they had

perished from suffocation.

It is believed that Mont Pelee threw off a great gasp of some

exceedingly heavy and noxious gas, something akin to firedamp, which

settled upon the city and rendered the inhabitants insensible. This was

followed by the sheet of flame that swept down the side of the mountain.

This theory is sustained by the experience of the survivors who were

taken from the ships in the harbor, as they say that their first

experience was one of faintness.

The dumb animals were wiser than man, and early took warning of the

storm of fire which Mont Pelee was storing up to hurl upon the island.

Even before the mountain began to rumble, late in April, live stock

became uneasy, and at times were almost uncontrollable. Cattle lowed in

the night. Dogs howled and sought the company of their masters, and when

driven forth they gave every evidence of fear.

Wild animals disappeared from the vicinity of Mont Pelee. Even the

snakes, which at ordinary times are found in great numbers near the

volcano, crawled away. Birds ceased singing and left the trees that

shaded the sides of Pelee. A great fear seemed to be upon the island,

and though it was shared by the human inhabitants, they alone neglected

to protect themselves.

Of the villages in the vicinity of St. Pierre only one escaped, the

others suffering the fate of the city. The fortunate one was Le Carbet,

on the south, which escaped uninjured, the flood of lava stopping when

within two hundred feet of the town. Morne Rouge, a beautiful summer

resort, frequented by the people of the island during the hot season as

a place of recreation, also escaped. In the height of the season several

thousand people gathered there, though at the time of the explosion

there were but a few hundred. Though located on an elevation between the

city and the crater, it was by great good fortune saved.

The Governor of Martinique, Mr. Mouttet, whose precautions to prevent

the people fleeing from the city aided to make the work of death

complete, was himself among the victims of the burning mountain. With

him in this fate was Colonel Dain, commander of the troops who formed a

cordon round the doomed city.

CHAPTER XXIX.

St. Vincent Island and Mont Soufriere in 1812.

Among all the islands of the Caribbees St. Vincent is unique in natural

wonders and beauties. Situated about ninety-five miles west of Barbados,

it has a length of eighteen and a width of eleven miles, the whole mass

being largely composed of a single peak which rises from the ocean’s

bed. From north to south volcanic hills traverse its length, their

ridges intersected by fertile and beautiful valleys.

A ridge of mountains crosses the island, dividing it into eastern and

western parts. Kingstown, the capital, a town of 8,000 inhabitants, is

on the southward side and extends along the shores of a beautiful

bay, with mountains gradually rising behind it in the form of a vast

amphitheatre. Three streets, broad and lined with good houses, run

parallel to the water-front. There are many other intersecting highways,

some of which lead back to the foothills, from which good roads ascend

the mountains.

The majority of the houses have red tile roofing and a goodly number of

them are of stone, one story high, with thick walls after the Spanish

style--the same types of houses that were in St. Pierre and which

are not unlike the old Roman houses which in all stages of ruin and

semi-preservation are found in Pompeii to this day.

Behind the general group of the houses of the town loom the Governor’s

residence and the buildings of the botanical gardens which overlook the

town.

Kingstown is the trading centre and the town of importance in the

island. It contains the churches and chapels of five Protestant

denominations and a number of excellent schools. Away from Kingstown,

and the smaller settlement of Georgetown, the population is almost

wholly rural, occupying scattered villages which consist of negro huts

clustering around a few substantial buildings or of cabins grouped about

old plantation buildings somewhat after the ante-bellum fashion in our

own Southern States.

One of the tragedies of the West Indies was the sinking of old Port

Royal, the resort of buccaneers, in 1692. The harbor of Kingstown is

commonly supposed to cover the site of the old settlement. There is

a tradition that a buoy for many years was attached to the spire of a

sunken church in order to warn mariners. Three thousand persons perished

in the disaster.

DESCENDANTS OF ORIGINAL INDIAN POPULATION

The northern portion of the island, that desolated by the recent

volcanic eruption, was inhabited by people living in the manner

just described, the great majority of them being negroes. The total

population of the island is about 45,000, of whom 30,000 are Africans

and about 3,000 Europeans, the remainder being nearly all Asiatics.

There are, or rather were, a number of Caribs, the descendants of the

original warlike Indian population of these islands. Many of these live

in St. Vincent, though there are others in Dominico. As their residence

was in the northern section of the island, the volcano seems to have

completed the work for the Caribs of this island which the Spaniard long

ago began. These Caribs were really half-breds, having amalgamated with

the negroes. Many of the blacks own land of their own, raising arrow

root, which, since the decay of the sugar industry, is the chief export.

In an island only eighteen miles long by eleven broad there is not room

for any distinctly marked mountain range. The whole of St. Vincent, in

fact, is a fantastic tumble of hills, culminating in the volcanic ridge

which runs lengthwise of the oval-shaped island. The culminating peak of

the great volcanic mass, for St. Vincent is nothing more, is Mont Garou,

of which La Soufriere is a sort of lofty excrescence in the northwest,

4,048 feet high, and flanking the main peak at some distance away.

It may be said that all the volcanic mountains in this part of the West

Indies have what the people call a “soufriere”--a “sulphur pit,” or

“sulphur crater”--the name coming, as in the case of past disturbances

of Mont Pelee, from the strong stench of sulphuretted hydrogen which

issues from them when the volcano becomes agitated.

In 1812 it was La Soufriere adjacent to Mont Garou which broke loose on

the island of St. Vincent, and it is the same Soufriere which again has

devastated the island and has bombarded Kingstown with rocks, lava and

ashes.

The old crater of Mont Garou has long been extinct, and, like the old

crater of Mont Pelee, near St. Pierre, it had far down in its depths,

surrounded by sheer cliffs from 500 to 800 feet high, a lake. Glimpses

of the lake of Mont Garou are difficult to get, owing to the thick

verdure growing about the dangerous edges of the precipices, but those

who have seen it describe it as a beautiful sheet of deep blue water.

THE APPEARANCE OF THE SOUFRIERE

Previous to the eruption of 1812 the appearance of the Soufriere was

most interesting. The crater was half a mile in diameter and five

hundred feet in depth. In its centre was a conical hill, fringed with

shrubs and vines; at whose base were two small lakes, one sulphurous,

the other pure and tasteless. This lovely and beautiful spot was

rendered more interesting by the singularly melodious notes of a bird,

an inhabitant of these upper solitudes, and altogether unknown to the

other parts of the island--hence called, or supposed to be, “invisible,”

as it had never been seen. (It is of interest to state that Frederick

A. Ober, in a visit to the island some twenty years ago, succeeded in

obtaining specimens of this previously unknown bird.) From the fissures

of the cone a thin white smoke exuded, occasionally tinged with a light

blue flame. Evergreens, flowers and aromatic shrubs clothed the steep

sides of the crater, which made, as the first indication of the eruption

on April 27, 1812, a tremulous noise in the air. A severe concussion of

the earth followed, and then a column of thick black smoke burst from

the crater.

THE ERUPTION OF 1812

The eruption which followed these premonitory symptoms was one of the

most terrific which had occurred in the West Indies up to that time. It

was the culminating event which seemed to relieve a pressure within the

earth’s crust which extended from the Mississippi Valley to Caracas,

Venezuela, producing terrible effects in the latter place. Here,

thirty-five days before the volcanic explosion, the ground was rent and

shaken by a frightful earthquake which hurled the city in ruins to the

ground and killed ten thousand of its inhabitants in a moment of time.

La Soufriere made the first historic display of its hidden powers in

1718, when lava poured from its crater. A far more violent demonstration

of its destructive forces was that above mentioned. On this occasion the

eruption lasted for three days, ruining a number of the estates in the

vicinity and destroying many lives. Myriads of tons of ashes, cinders,

pumice and scoriae, hurled from the crater, fell in every section of

the island. Volumes of sand darkened the air, and woods, ridges and cane

fields were covered with light gray ashes, which speedily destroyed all

vegetation. The sun for three days seemed to be in a total eclipse,

the sea was discolored and the ground bore a wintry appearance from the

white crust of fallen ashes.

Carib natives who lived at Morne Rond fled from their houses to

Kingstown. As the third day drew to a close flames sprang pyramidically

from the crater, accompanied by loud thunder and electric flashes,

which rent the column of smoke hanging over the volcano. Eruptive matter

pouring from the northwest side plunged over the cliff, carrying down

rocks and woods in its course. The island was shaken by an earthquake

and bombarded with showers of cinders and stones, which set houses on

fire and killed many of the natives.

THE TERRIBLE EARTHQUAKE AT CARACAS

For nearly two years before this explosion earthquakes had been common,

and sea and land had been agitated from the valley of the Mississippi to

the coasts of Venezuela and the mountains of New Grenada, and from the

Azores to the West Indies. On March 26, 1812, these culminated in the

terrible tragedy, spoken of above, of which Humboldt gives us a vivid

account.

On that day the people of the Venezuelan city of Caracas were assembled

in the churches, beneath a still and blazing sky, when the earth

suddenly heaved and shook, like a great monster waking from slumber,

and in a single minute 10,000 people were buried beneath the walls of

churches and houses, which tumbled in hideous ruin upon their heads. The

same earthquake made itself felt along the whole line of the Northern

Cordilleras, working terrible destruction, and shook the earth as far

as Santa Fe de Bogota and Honda, 180 leagues from Caracas. This was a

preliminary symptom of the internal disorder of the earth.

While the wretched inhabitants of Caracas who had escaped the earthquake

were dying of fever and starvation, and seeking among villages and

farms places of safety from the renewed earthquake shocks, the almost

forgotten volcano of St. Vincent was muttering in suppressed wrath. For

twelve months it had given warning, by frequent shocks of the earth,

that it was making ready to play its part in the great subterranean

battle. On the 27th of April its deep-hidden powers broke their bonds,

and the conflict between rock and fire began.

THE MOUNTAIN STONES A HERD-BOY

The first intimation of the outbreak was rather amusing than alarming.

A negro boy was herding cattle on the mountain side. A stone fell near

him. Another followed. He fancied that some other boys were pelting him

from the cliff above, and began throwing stones upward at his fancied

concealed tormentors. But the stones fell thicker, among them some too

large to be thrown by any human hand. Only then did the little fellow

awake to the fact that it was not a boy like himself, but the mighty

mountain, that was flinging these stones at him. He looked up and saw

that the black column which was rising from the crater’s mouth was no

longer harmless vapor, but dust, ashes and stones. Leaving the cattle to

their fate, he fled for his life, while the mighty cannon of the Titans

roared behind him as he ran. For three days and nights this continued;

then, on the 30th, a stream of lava poured over the crater’s rim and

rushed downward, reaching the sea in four hours, and the great eruption

was at an end.

On the same day, says Humboldt, at a distance of more than 200 leagues,

“the inhabitants not only of Caracas, but of Calabozo, situated in

the midst of the Lianos, over a space of 4,000 square leagues, were

terrified by a subterranean noise which resembled frequent discharges of

the heaviest cannon. It was accompanied by no shock, and, what is very

remarkable, was as loud on the coast as at eighty leagues’ distance

inland, and at Caracas, as well as at Calabozo, preparations were made

to put the place in defence against an enemy who seemed to be advancing

with heavy artillery.”

It was no enemy that man could deal with. Fortunately, it confined its

assault to deep noises, and desisted from earthquake shocks. Similar

noises were heard in Martinique and Guadeloupe, and here also without

shocks. The internal thunder was the signal of what was taking place on

St. Vincent. With this last warning sound the trouble, which had lasted

so long, was at an end. The earthquakes which for two years had shaken

a sheet of the earth’s surface larger than half Europe, were stilled by

the eruption of St. Vincent’s volcanic peak.

BARBADOS COVERED WITH ASHES

Northeast of the original crater of the Soufriere a new one was formed

which was a half mile in diameter and five hundred feet deep. The old

crater was in time transformed into a beautiful blue lake, as above

stated, walled in by ragged cliffs to a height of eight hundred feet.

It was looked upon as a remarkable circumstance that although the air

was perfectly calm during the eruption, Barbados, which is ninety-five

miles to the windward, was covered inches deep with ashes. The

inhabitants there and on other neighboring islands were terrified by the

darkness, which continued for four hours and a half. Troops were called

under arms, the supposition from the continued noise being that hostile

fleets were in an engagement.

The movement of the ashes to windward, as just stated, was viewed as a

remarkable phenomenon, and is cited by Elise Reclus, in “The Ocean,” to

show the force of different aerial currents; “On the first day of May,

1812, when the northeast trade-wind was in all its force, enormous

quantities of ashes obscured the atmosphere above the Island of

Barbados, and covered the ground with a thick layer. One would have

supposed that they came from the volcanoes of the Azores, which were

to the northeast; nevertheless they were cast up by the crater in St.

Vincent, one hundred miles to the west. It is therefore certain that the

debris had been hurled, by the force of the eruption, above the moving

sheet of the trade-winds into an aerial river proceeding in a contrary

direction.” For this it must have been hurled miles high into the air,

till caught by the current of the anti-trade winds.

KINGSLEY’S VISIT TO SAINT VINCENT

From Charles Kingsley’s “At Last” we extract, from the account of the

visit of the author to St. Vincent, some interesting matter concerning

the 1812 eruption and its effect on the mountain; also its influence

upon distant Barbados, as just stated.

“The strangest fact about this eruption was, that the mountain did not

make use of its old crater. The original vent must have become so jammed

and consolidated, in the few years between 1785 and 1812, that it could

not be reopened, even by a steam force the vastness of which may be

guessed at from the vastness of the area which it had shaken for

two years. So, when the eruption was over, it was found that the old

crater-lake, incredible as it may seem, remained undisturbed, so far

as has been ascertained; but close to it, and separated only by a

knife-edge of rock some 700 feet in height, and so narrow that, as I

was assured by one who had seen it, it is dangerous to crawl along it,

a second crater, nearly as large as the first, had been blasted out, the

bottom of which, in like manner, was afterward filled with water.

“I regretted much that I could not visit it. Three points I longed

to ascertain carefully--the relative heights of the water in the two

craters; the height and nature of the spot where the lava stream issued;

and, lastly, if possible, the actual causes of the locally famous

Rabacca, or ‘Dry River,’ one of the largest streams in the island,

which was swallowed up during the eruption, at a short distance from its

source, leaving its bed an arid gully to this day. But it could not be,

and I owe what little I know of the summit of the soufriere principally

to a most intelligent and gentleman-like young Wesleyan minister, whose

name has escaped me. He described vividly, as we stood together on the

deck, looking up at the volcano, the awful beauty of the twin lakes, and

of the clouds which, for months together, whirl in and out of the cups

in fantastic shapes before the eddies of the trade wind.

BLACK SUNDAY AT BARBADOS

“The day after the explosion, ‘Black Sunday,’ gave a proof of, though no

measure of, the enormous force which had been exerted. Eighty miles to

windward lies Barbados. All Saturday a heavy cannonading had been heard

to the eastward. The English and French fleets were surely engaged. The

soldiers were called out; the batteries manned; but the cannonade died

away, and all went to bed in wonder. On the 1st of May the clocks struck

six, but the sun did not, as usual in the tropics, answer to the call.

The darkness was still intense, and grew more intense as the morning

wore on. A slow and silent rain of impalpable dust was falling over the

whole island. The negroes rushed shrieking into the streets. Surely the

last day was come. The white folk caught (and little blame to them) the

panic, and some began to pray who had not prayed for years. The pious

and the educated (and there were plenty of both in Barbados) were not

proof against the infection. Old letters describe the scene in the

churches that morning as hideous--prayers, sobs, and cries, in Stygian

darkness, from trembling crowds. And still the darkness continued and

the dust fell.

INCIDENTS AT BARBADOS

“I have a letter written by one long since dead, who had at least powers

of description of no common order, telling how, when he tried to go out

of his house upon the east coast, he could not find the trees on his own

lawn save by feeling for their stems. He stood amazed not only in utter

darkness, but in utter silence; for the trade-wind had fallen dead,

the everlasting roar of the surf was gone, and the only noise was the

crashing of branches, snapped by the weight of the clammy dust. He went

in again, and waited. About one o’clock the veil began to lift; a

lurid sunlight stared in from the horizon, but all was black overhead.

Gradually the dust drifted away; the island saw the sun once more, and

saw itself inches deep in black, and in this case fertilizing, dust. The

trade-wind blew suddenly once more out of the clear east, and the surf

roared again along the shore.

“Meanwhile a heavy earthquake-wave had struck part at least of the

shores of Barbados. The gentleman on the east coast, going out, found

traces of the sea, and boats and logs washed up some ten to twenty feet

above high-tide mark; a convulsion which seemed to have gone unmarked

during the general dismay.

“One man at least, an old friend of John Hunter, Sir Joseph Banks and

others their compeers, was above the dismay, and the superstitious panic

which accompanied it. Finding it still dark when he rose to dress, he

opened (so the story used to run) his window; found it stick, and felt

upon the sill a coat of soft powder. ‘The volcano in St. Vincent has

broken out at last,’ said the wise man, ‘and this is the dust of it.’ So

he quieted his household and his negroes, lighted his candles, and went

to his scientific books, in that delight, mingled with an awe not the

less deep, because it is rational and self-possessed, with which he,

like the other men of science, looked at the wonders of this wondrous

world.”

CHAPTER XXX.

Submarine Volcanoes and their Work of Island Building.

In November, 1867, a volcano suddenly began to show signs of activity

beneath the deep sea of the Pacific Ocean. There are some islands nearly

two thousands miles to the east of Australia called the Navigator’s

Group, in which there had been no history of an eruption, nor had such

an event been handed down by tradition. Most of the islands in the

Pacific Ocean are old volcanoes, or are made up of rocks cast forth from

extinct burning mountains. They rise up like peaks through the

great depths of the ocean, and the top, which just appears above the

sea-level, is generally encircled by a growth of coral. Hence they are

termed coral islands. These islands every now and then rise higher than

the sea-level, owing to some deep upheaving force, and then the coral is

lifted up above the water, and become a solid rock. But occasionally the

reverse of this takes place, and the islands begin to sink into the

sea, owing to a force which causes the base of the submarine mountain

to become depressed. Sometimes they disappear. All this shows that some

great disturbing forces are in action at the bottom of the sea, and just

within the earth’s crust, and that they are of a volcanic nature.

For some time before the eruption in question, earthquakes shook the

surrounding islands of the Navigator’s Group, and caused great alarm,

and when the trembling of the earth was very great, the sea began to be

agitated near one of the islands, and vast circles of disturbed water

were formed. Soon the water began to be forced upwards, and dead fish

were seen floating about. After a while, steam rushed forth, and jets of

mud and volcanic sand. Moreover, when the steam began to rush up out of

the water, the violence of the general agitation of the land and of the

surface of the sea increased.

AN ERUPTION DESCRIBED

When the eruption was at its height vast columns of mud and masses of

stone rushed into the air to a height of 2,000 feet, and the fearful

crash of masses of rock hurled upwards and coming in collision with

others which were falling attested the great volume of ejected matter

which accumulated in the bed of the ocean, although no trace of a

volcano could be seen above the surface of the sea. Similar submarine

volcanic action has been observed in the Atlantic Ocean, and crews of

ships have reported that they have seen in different places sulphurous

smoke, flame, jets of water, and steam, rising up from the sea, or they

have observed the waters greatly discolored and in a state of violent

agitation, as if boiling in large circles.

New shoals have also been encountered, or a reef of rocks just emerging

above the surface, where previously there was always supposed to have

been deep water. On some few occasions, the gradual building up of an

island by submarine volcanoes has been observed, as that of Sabrina in

1181, off St. Michael’s, in the Azores. The throwing up of ashes in this

case, and the formation of a conical hill 300 feet high, with a crater

out of which spouted lava and steam, took place very rapidly. But the

waves had the best of it, and finally washed Sabrina into the depths of

the ocean. Previous eruptions in the same part of the sea were recorded

as having happened in 1691 and 1720.

In 1831, a submarine volcanic eruption occurred in the Mediterranean

Sea, between Sicily and that part of the African coast where Carthage

formerly stood. A few years before, Captain Smyth had sounded the

spot in a survey of the sea ordered by Government, and he found the

sea-bottom to be under 500 feet of water. On June 28, about a fortnight

before the eruption was visible, Sir Pulteney Malcom, in passing over

the spot in his ship, felt the shock of an earthquake as if he had

struck on a sandbank, and the same shocks were felt on the west coast of

Sicily, in a direction from south-west to north-east.

BUILDING UP OF AN ISLAND BY SUBMARINE VOLCANOES

About July 10, the captain of a Sicilian vessel reported that as he

passed near the place he saw a column of water like a waterspout, sixty

feet high, and 800 yards in circumference, rising from the sea, and soon

after a dense rush of steam in its place, which ascended to the height

of 1,800 feet. The same captain, on his return eighteen days after,

found a small island twelve feet high, with a crater in its centre,

throwing forth volcanic matter and immense columns of vapor, the sea

around being covered with floating cinders and dead fish. The eruption

continued with great violence to the end of the same month. By the end

of the month the island grew to ninety feet in height, and measured

three-quarters of a mile round. By August 4th it became 200 feet high

and three miles in circumference; after which it began to diminish in

size by the action of the waves. Towards the end of October the island

was levelled nearly to the surface of the sea.

Naval officers and foreign ministers alike took an absorbing interest

in this new island. The strong national thirst for territory manifested

itself and eager mariners waited only till the new land should be cool

enough to set foot on to strive who should be first to plant there

his country’s flag. Names in abundance were given it by successive

observers,--Nerita, Sciacca, Fernandina, Julia, Hotham, Corrao, and

Graham. The last holds good in English speech, and as Graham’s Island

it is known in books to-day, though the sea took back what it had given,

leaving but a shoal of cinders and sand.

The Bay of Santorin, in the island of that name, which lies immediately

to the north of Crete, has long been noted for its submarine volcanoes.

According to one account, indeed, the whole island was at a remote

period raised from the bottom of the sea; but this is questionable. It

is, with more reason, supposed that the bay is the site of an ancient

crater, which was situated on the summit of a volcanic cone that

subsequently fell in. Certain it is that islands have from time to time

been thrown up by volcanic forces from the bottom of the sea within this

bay, and that some of them have remained, while others have sunk again.

HOW AN ISLAND GREW

Of the existing islands, some were thrown up shortly before the

beginning of the Christian era; in particular, one called the Great

Cammeni, which, however, received a considerable accession to its size

by a fresh eruption in A. D. 726. The islet nearest Santorin was raised

in 1573, and was named the Little Cammeni; and in 1707 there was added,

between the other two, a third, which is now called the Black Island.

This made its appearance above water on the 23rd of May, 1707, and was

first mistaken for a wreck; but some sailors, who landed on it, found

it to be a mass of rock; consisting of a very white soft stone, to which

were adhering quantities of fresh oysters. While they were collecting

these, a violent shaking of the ground scared them away.

During several weeks the island gradually increased in volume; but in

July, at a distance of about sixty paces from the new islet, there was

thrown up a chain of black calcined rocks, followed by volumes of thick

black smoke, having a sulphurous smell. A few days thereafter the water

all around the spot became hot, and many dead fishes were thrown up.

Then, with loud subterraneous noises, flames arose, and fresh quantities

of stones and other substances were ejected, until the chain of black

rocks became united to the first islet that had appeared. This eruption

continued for a long time, there being thrown out quantities of ashes

and pumice, which covered the island of Santorin and the surface of the

sea--some being drifted to the coasts of Asia Minor and the Dardanelles.

The activity of this miniature volcano was prolonged, with greater or

less energy, for about ten years.

In 1866 similar phenomena took place in the Bay of Santorin, beginning

with underground sounds and slight shocks of earthquake, which were

followed by the appearance of flames on the surface of the sea. Soon

after there arose, out of a dense smoke, a small islet, which gradually

increased until in a week’s time it was 60 feet high, 200 long and 90

wide. The people of Santorin named it “George,” in honor of the King of

Greece. In another week it joined and became continuous with the Little

Cammeni. The detonations increased in loudness, and large quantities of

incandescent stones were thrown up from the crater.

About the same time, at the distance of nearly 150 feet from the coast,

to the westward of a point called Cape Phlego, there rose from the sea

another island, to which was given the name of Aphroessa. It sank and

reappeared several times before it established itself above water. The

detonations and ejection of incandescent lava and stones continued at

intervals during three weeks. From the crater of the islet George, which

attained a height of 150 feet, some stones several cubic yards in bulk

were projected to a great distance. One of them falling on board of a

merchant vessel, killed the captain and set fire to the ship.

By the 10th of March the eruptions had partially subsided, but were then

renewed, and a third island, which was named Reka, rose alongside of

Aphroessa. They were at first separated by a channel sixty feet deep;

but in three days this was filled up, and the two islets became united.

Reference may properly be made here to Monte Nuovo and Jorullo, not that

they appertain to the present subject, but that they form examples of

the action of similar forces, in the one instance exerted on a lake

bottom, in the other on dry land, each yielding permanent volcanic

elevations in every respect analogous to those which rise as islands

from the bottom of the sea.

IN THE ICELANDIC SEAS

Off the coast of Iceland islands have appeared during several of

the volcanic eruptions which that remote dependency of Denmark has

manifested, and at various periods in Iceland’s history the sea has been

covered with pumice and other debris, which tell their own tale of what

has been going on, without being in sufficient quantity to reach the

surface in the form of an island mass. The sea off Reykjanes--Smoky

Cape, as the name means--has been a frequent scene of these submarine

eruptions. In 1240, during what the Icelandic historians describe as

the eighth outburst, a number of islets were formed, though most of them

subsequently disappeared, only to have their places occupied by others

born at a later date. In 1422 high rocks of considerable circumference

appeared. In 1783, about a month before the eruption of Skaptar Jokull,

a volcanic island named Nyoe, from which fire and smoke issued, was

built up. But in time it vanished under the waves, all that remains

of it to-day being a reef from five to thirty-five fathoms below the

sea-level. In 1830, after several long-continued eruptions of the usual

character, another isle arose; while at the same time the skerries known

as the Geirfuglaska disappeared, and with them vanished the great auks,

or gare-fowls--birds now extinct--which up to that time had bred on

them. At all events, though the auks could not well have been drowned,

no traces of them were seen after the date mentioned. In July, 1884, an

island again appeared about ten miles off Reykjanes; but it is already

beginning to diminish in size, and may soon disappear.

OFF THE COAST OF ALASKA

Elsewhere in the region of the northern seas there are other instances

of the influence of the submarine forces in raising up and lowering

land. The coast of Alaska is a region of intense volcanic action. In

1795, during a period of volcanic activity in the craters of Makushina,

on Unalaska, and in others on Umnak Island, a volume of smoke was seen

to rise out of the sea about 42 miles to the north of Unalaska, and

the next year it was followed by a heap of cindery material, from which

arose flame and volcanic matter, the glow being visible over a radius

of ten miles. In four years the island grew into a large cone, 3000 feet

above the sea-level, and two or three miles in circumference. Two years

later it was still so hot that when some hunters landed on it they found

the soil too warm for walking. It was named Ionna Bogoslova (St. John

the Theologian), by the Russians, Agashagok by the Aleuts, and is now

known to the whites of that region as Bogosloff. Mr. Dall believes

that it occupies the site of some rocks that existed there as long as

tradition extends.

There were additions to the cone up to the year 1823, when it became so

quiescent as to be the favorite haunt of seals and sea-fowls, and,

when the weather was favorable, was visited by native egg-hunters

from Unalaska. During the summer of 1883 Bogosloff was again seen

in eruption, as it was thought. However, on closely examining the

neighborhood, it was found that the old island was undisturbed, but that

there had been a fresh eruption, which had resulted in the extension of

Bogosloff by the appearance of a cone and crater (Hague Volcano), 357

feet high, connected with the parent island by a low sand-spit, and

situated in a spot where, the year before, the lead showed 800 fathoms

of water. At the same time Augustin and two other previously quiet

islands on the peninsula of Alaska began simultaneously to emit smoke,

dust and ashes, while a reef running westward and formerly submerged

became elevated to the sea surface. Other islands, of origin exactly

similar to Bogosloff and those mentioned, are to be found in this

region, notably Koniugi and Kasatochi, in the western Aleutians,

and Pinnacle Island, near St. Matthew Island. Indeed, the volcano of

Kliutchevsk, which rises to a height of over 15,000 feet, is really a

volcanic island.

A permanent addition was made to the Aleutian group of Islands by the

action of a submarine volcano in 1806. This new island has the form of

a volcanic peak, with several subsidiary cones. It is four geographical

miles in circumference. In 1814 another arose out of the sea in the same

archipelago, the cone of which attained a height of 3,000 feet; but at

the end of a year it lost a portion of this elevation.

In 1856, in the sea in the same neighborhood, Captain Newell, of the

whaling bark Alice Fraser, witnessed a submarine eruption, which was

also seen by the crews of several other vessels. There was no island

formed on this occasion, but large jets of water were thrown up, and the

sea was greatly agitated all around. Then followed volcanic smoke, and

quantities of stones, ashes, and pumice; the two latter being scattered

over the surface of the sea to a great distance. Loud thundering reports

accompanied this eruption, and all the ships in the neighborhood felt

concussions like those produced by an earthquake. These phenomena seem

to have ended in the formation of some great submarine chasm, into which

the waters rushed with extreme violence and a terrific roar.

Occurrences similar to this last have been several times observed in

a tract of open sea in the Atlantic, about half a degree south of the

equator, and between 20 and 22 degrees of west longitude. Although

quantities of volcanic dross have been from time to time thrown up to

the surface in this region, no island has yet made its appearance above

water.

The events here described repeat on a far smaller scale similar ones

which have occurred in remote ages in many parts of the ocean and left

great island masses as the permanent effects of their work. We may

instance the Hawaiian group, which is wholly of volcanic origin, with

the exception of its minor coral additions, and represents a stupendous

activity of underground agencies beneath the domain of Father Neptune.

In part, as we have said elsewhere in this work, all oceanic islands,

remote from those in the shoal bordering waters of the continents, have

been of volcanic or coral formation, or more often a combination of the

two. No sooner does an island mass appear above or near the surface of

tropical waters than the minute coral animals--effective only by their

myriads--begin their labors, building fringes of coral rock around

the cindery heaps lifted from the ocean floor. The atolls of the

Pacific--circular or oval rings of coral with lagunes of sea-water

within--have long been thought to be built on the rims of submarine

volcanoes, rising to within a few hundred feet of the surface, much

as coral reefs around actual islands. If the volcanic mass should

subsequently subside, as it is likely to do, the minute ocean builders

will continue their work--unless the subsidence be too rapid for their

powers of production--and in this way ring-like islands of coral may

in time rise from great depths of sea, their basis being the volcanic

island which has sunk from near the surface far toward old ocean’s

primal floor.

CHAPTER XXXI.

Mud Volcanoes, Geysers, and Hot Springs.

Our usual impression of a volcano is indicated in the title of “burning

mountain,” so often employed, a great fire-spouting cone of volcanic

debris, from which steam, lava, rock-masses, cinder-like fragments, and

dust, often of extreme fineness, are flung high into the air or flow

in river-like torrents of molten rock. This, no doubt, applies in the

majority of cases, but the volcanic forces do not confine themselves to

these magnificent displays of energy, nor are their products limited to

those above specified. We have seen that mud is a not uncommon product,

due to the mingling of water with volcanic dust, while water alone is

occasionally emitted, of which we have a marked instance in the Volcan

de Agua, of Guatemala, already mentioned. As regards mud flows, we may

specially instance the first outflow from Mont Pelee, that by which the

Guerin sugar works were overwhelmed.

The imprisoned forces of the earth have still other modes of

manifestation. A very frequent one of these, and the most destructive to

human life of them all, is the earthquake.

Minor manifestations of volcanic action may be seen in the geyser and

the hot spring, the latter the most widely disseminated of all the

resultant effects of the heated condition of the earth’s interior. It

is these displays of subterranean energy, differing from those usually

termed volcanic, yet due to the same general causes, that we have next

to consider. And it may be premised that their manifestations, while,

except in the case of the earthquake, less violent, are no less

interesting, especially as the minor displays are free from that peril

to human life which renders the major ones so terrible.

While the largest volcanoes at times pour out rivers of liquid mud,

there are volcanoes from which nothing is ever ejected but mud and

water, the latter being generally salt. From this circumstance they

are sometimes called salses, but they are more generally termed

mud-volcanoes. Some varieties of them throw out little else than gases

of different sorts, and these are called air-volcanoes.

THE GREAT MUD VOLCANO OF SICILY

One of the best known mud-volcanoes is at Macaluba, near Girgenti, in

Sicily. It consists of several conical mounds, varying from time to time

in their form and height, which ranges from eight to thirty feet. From

orifices on the tops of these mounds there are thrown out sometimes jets

of warmish water and mud mixed with bitumen, sometimes bubbles of

gas, chiefly carbonic acid and carburetted hydrogen, occasionally pure

nitrogen. The mud ejected has often a strong sulphurous smell. The jets

in general ascend only to a moderate height; but occasionally they are

thrown up with great violence, attaining a height of about 200 feet.

In 1777 there was ejected an immense column, consisting of mud strongly

impregnated with sulphur and mixed with naphtha and stones, accompanied

also by quantities of sulphurous vapors. This mud-volcano is known to

have been in action for fifteen centuries.

Very recently a small mud-volcano has been formed on the flanks of Mount

Etna. It began with the throwing up of jets of boiling water, mixed with

petroleum and mud, great quantities of gas bubbling up at the same time.

In several of the valleys of Iceland there are similar phenomena, the

boiling water and mud being thrown up in jets to the height of fifteen

feet and upwards, the mud accumulating around the orifices whence the

jets arise.

A mud-volcano named Korabetoff, in the Crimea, presents phenomena more

akin to those of the igneous volcanoes of South America. There was an

eruption from this mountain on the 6th of August, 1853. It began by

throwing up from the summit a column of fire and smoke, which ascended

to a great height. This continued for five or six minutes, and was

followed at short intervals by two similar eruptions. There was then

ejected with a hissing noise a quantity of black fetid mud, which was so

hot as to scorch the grass on the edges of the stream. The mud continued

to pour out for three hours, covering a wide space at the mountain’s

base. The mud-volcanoes on the coast of Beloochistan are very numerous,

and extend over an area of nearly a thousand square miles. Their action

resembles that at Macaluba.

THE MUD VOLCANO OF JAVA

There is a mud volcano in Java which is of interest as somewhat

resembling the geyser in its mode of operation and apparently due to

similar agencies. It is thus described by Dr. Horsfield:--

“On approaching it from a distance, it is first discovered by a large

volume of smoke, rising and disappearing at intervals of a few seconds,

resembling the vapors rising from a violent surf. A loud noise is heard,

like that of distant thunder. Having advanced so near that the vision

was no longer impeded by the smoke, a large hemispherical mass was

observed, consisting of black earth mixed with water, about sixteen

feet in diameter, rising to the height of twenty or thirty feet in

a perfectly regular manner, and as if it were pushed up by a force

beneath, which suddenly exploded with a loud noise, and scattered about

a volume of black mud in every direction. After an interval of two or

three, or sometimes four or five seconds, the hemispherical body of mud

rose and exploded again. In the manner stated this volcanic ebullition

goes on without interruption, throwing up a globular body of mud, and

dispersing it with violence through the neighboring plain. The spot

where the ebullition occurs is nearly circular, and perfectly level. It

is covered only with the earthy particles, impregnated with salt water,

which are thrown up from below. The circumference may be estimated at

about half an English mile. In order to conduct the salt water to the

circumference, small passages or gutters are made in the loose muddy

earth, which lead to the borders, where it is collected in holes dug in

the ground for the purpose of evaporation.”

The mud has a strong, pungent, sulphurous smell, resembling that of

mineral oil, and is hotter than the surrounding atmosphere. During the

rainy season the explosions increase in violence.

There are submarine mud volcanoes as well as those of igneous kind. In

1814 one of this character broke out in the Sea of Azof, beginning with

flame and black smoke, accompanied by earth and stones, which were flung

to a great height. Ten of these explosions occurred, and, after a period

of rest, others were heard during the night. The next morning there

was visible above the water an island of mud some ten feet high. A very

similar occurrence took place in 1827, near Baku, in the Caspian sea.

This began with a flaming display and the ejection of great fragments of

rock. An eruption of mud succeeded. A set of small volcanoes discovered

by Humboldt in Turbaco, in South America, confined their emissions

almost wholly to gases, chiefly nitrogen.

There is a close connection in character between mud volcanoes and

those intermittent boiling springs named geysers. A good many of the mud

volcanoes throw out jets of boiling water along with the mud; but in

the case of the geysers, the boiling water is ejected alone, without

any visible impregnation, though some mineral in solution, as silica,

carbonate of lime, or sulphur, is usually present.

THE GEYSER IS A WATER VOLCANO

The phenomenon of the geyser serves in a measure to support the theory

that steam is an important agent in volcanic action. A geyser, in fact,

may be designated as a water volcano, since it throws up water only. It

comprises a cone or mound, usually only a few feet high. In the middle

of this is a crater-like opening with a passage leading down into the

earth. As in the case of the volcano, the geyser cone is built up by its

own action. In the boiling water which is ejected there is dissolved a

certain amount of silica. As the water falls and cools this mineral is

deposited, gradually building up a cup-like elevation. The basin of the

geyser is generally full of clear water, with a little steam rising

from its surface; but at intervals an eruption takes place, sometimes at

regular periods, but more often at irregular intervals.

Among the largest and best known geysers in the world are those of

Iceland, chief among them being the Great Geyser. Silica is the

mineral with which the waters of this fountain are impregnated, and

the substance which they deposit, as they slowly evaporate, is named

siliceous sinter. Of this material is composed the mound, six or seven

feet high, on which the spring is situated. On the top of the mound is

a large oval basin, about three feet in depth, measuring in its larger

diameter about fifty-six, and in its shorter about forty-six feet. The

centre of this basin is occupied by a circular well about ten feet in

diameter, and between seventy and eighty feet deep.

Out of the central well springs a jet of boiling water, at intervals of

six or seven hours. When the fountain is at rest, both the basin and the

well appear quite empty, and no steam is seen. But on the approach of

the moment for action, the water rises in the well, till it flows over

into the basin. Then loud subterranean explosions are heard, and the

ground all round is violently shaken.

Instantly, and with immense force, a steaming jet of boiling water, of

the full width of the well, springs up and ascends to a great height

in the air. The top of this large column of water is enveloped in vast

clouds of steam, which diffuse themselves through the air, rendering it

misty. These jets succeed each other with great rapidity to the number

of sixteen or eighteen, the period of action of the fountain being about

five minutes. The last of the jets generally ascends to the greatest

height, usually to about 100, but sometimes to 150 feet; on one occasion

it rose to the great height of 212 feet. Having ejected this great

column of water, the action ceases, and the water that had filled the

basin sinks down into the well. There it remains till the time for the

next eruption, when the same phenomena are repeated. It has been found

that, by throwing large stones into the well, the period of the eruption

may be hastened, while the loudness of the explosions and the violence

of the fountain effect are increased, the stones being at the same time

ejected with great force.

ERUPTION CAN BE INDUCED BY ARTIFICIAL MEANS

Geysers are found all over the island, presenting various peculiarities.

In the case of one of the smaller ones, which is called Strokr, or the

Churn, an eruption can be induced by artificial means. A barrow-load of

sods is thrown into the crater of the geyser, with the effect of causing

an eruption. The sensitiveness of Strokr is due to its peculiar form.

An observer states that, “The bore is eight feet in diameter at the

top, and forty-four feet deep. Below twenty-seven feet it contracts to

nineteen inches, so that the turf thrown in completely chokes it. Steam

collects below; a foaming scum covers the surface of the water, and in

a quarter of an hour it surges up the pipe. The fountain then begins

playing, sending its bundles of jets rather higher than those of

the Great Geyser, flinging up the clods of turf which have been its

obstruction like a number of rockets. This magnificent display continues

for a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes. The erupted water flows

back into the pipe from the curved sides of the bowl. This occasions a

succession of bursts, the last expiring effort, very generally, being

the most magnificent. Strokr gives no warning thumps, like the Great

Geyser, and there is not the same roaring of steam accompanying the

outbreak of the water.”

The same author thus describes an eruption of the Great Geyser, which

occurred about two o’clock in the morning: “A violent concussion of the

ground brought me and my companions to our feet. We rushed out of the

tent in every condition of dishabille and were in time to see Geyser put

forth his full strength. Five strokes underground were the signal, then

an overflow, wetting every side of the mound. Presently a dome of

water rose in the centre of the basin and fell again, immediately to

be followed by a fresh bell, which sprang into the air fully forty feet

high, accompanied by a roaring burst of steam. Instantly the fountain

began to play with the utmost violence, a column rushing up to the

height of ninety or one hundred feet against the gray night sky, with

mighty volumes of white steam cloud rolling after it and swept off by

the breeze to fall in torrents of hot rain. Jets and lines of water tore

their way through the clouds, or leaped high above its domed mass. The

earth trembled and throbbed during the explosion, then the column sank,

started up again, dropped once more, and seemed to be sucked back into

the earth. We ran to the basin, which was left dry, and looked down the

bore at the water, which was bubbling at the depth of six feet.”

In the case of Strokr, the cause of this eruption is not difficult to

understand. The narrow part of the channel is choked up by the turf and

the steam, and prevented from escaping. Finally it gains such force as

to drive out the obstacle with a violent explosion, just as a bottle

of fermenting liquor may blow out the cork and discharge some of its

contents.

Geysers are somewhat abundant phenomena, existing in many parts of the

earth, while striking examples of them are found in the widely separated

regions of Iceland, New Zealand, Japan and the western United States.

In the volcanic region of New Zealand geysers and their associated hot

springs are abundant. It was to their action that we owed the famous

white and pink terraces and the warm lake of Rotomahana which were

ruined by the destructive eruption of Mount Tarawera, already described.

GEYSERS OF THE UNITED STATES

The United States is abundantly supplied with hot springs, but geysers,

outside of the Yellowstone region, are found only in California and

Nevada. Those of California exist chiefly in Napa Valley, north of San

Francisco, in a canon or defile. Their waters are impregnated not with

silica, but with sulphur, and they thus approach more nearly in their

character to mud-volcanoes, whose ejections are, in like manner, much

impregnated with that substance. They are also, like them, collected in

groups, there being no less than one hundred openings within a space of

flat ground a mile square. Owing to their number and proximity, their

individual energy is nothing like so violent as that of the geysers of

Iceland. Their jets seldom rise higher than 20 or 30 feet; but so great

a number playing within so confined a space produces an imposing effect.

The jets of boiling water issue with a loud noise from little conical

mounds, around which the ground is merely a crust of sulphur. When this

crust is penetrated, the boiling water may be seen underneath. The rocks

in the neighborhood of these fountains are all corroded by the action of

the sulphurous vapors. Nevertheless, within a distance of not more than

50 feet from them, trees grow without injury to their health.

Few of these fountains, however, are regular geysers, most of them

discharging only steam. From the Steamboat Geyser this ascends to a

height of from 50 to 100 feet, with a roar like that of the escape

from a steamboat boiler. Associated with the geysers are numerous hot

springs, some clear, some turbid, and variously impregnated with

iron, sulphur or alum. In Nevada the Steamboat Springs, as they are

designated, exist in Washoe Valley, east of the Virginian range. They

come nearer in character to the Yellowstone geysers, their waters

depositing true geyserite, or silicious concretions. The Volcano

Springs, in Lauder County, are also true geysers, though of small

importance. The ground here is so thickly perforated by holes from which

steam escapes that it looks like a cullender.

THE YELLOWSTONE GEYSERS

The most remarkable geyser country in the world, alike for the size and

the number of its spouting fountains, is the Yellowstone region in the

northwest part of the Territory of Wyoming, in the United States, which,

by a special act of Congress, has been reserved as the Yellowstone

National Park, exempt from settlement, purchase or preemption. Here

nearly every form of geyser and unintermittent hot spring occurs,

with deposits of various kinds, silicious, calcareous, etc. Of the

hot springs, Dr. Peale enumerates 2,195, and considers that within the

limits of the park--which is about 54 miles by 62 miles, and includes

3,312 square miles--as many as 3,000 actually exist. The same geologist

notes the existence of 71 geysers in the area mentioned, though some

of the number are only inferred to be spouting springs from the form of

their basins and the character of the surrounding deposits. Of this

vast collection of still and eruptive springs, between which there seems

every gradation, those which do not send water into the air are, owing

to the magnificent cascades which they form, often quite as remarkable

as those which take the shape of geysers. The more striking of the

latter may, however, be briefly mentioned.

In the Gibbon Basin is a geyser of late origin. In 1878 this consisted

of two steam holes, roaring on the side of a hill, that looked as if

they had recently burst through the surface; and the gully leading

towards the ravine was at that date filled with sand, which appeared to

have been poured out during an eruption. Dead trees stood on the line of

this sand floor, and others, with their bark still remaining, and

even with their foliage not lost, were uprooted hard by, everything

indicating that the “steamboat vent,” as it was called, was of recent

formation. In 1875 it had no existence, but in 1879 the spouting

spring--which first opened, it is believed, on the 11th of August in the

preceding year--had “settled down to business as a very powerful flowing

geyser,” with a double period; one eruption occurring every half

hour, and projecting water to the height of 30 feet; the main eruption

occurring every six or seven days, with long continued action, and a

column of nearly 100 feet.

The New Geyser in the same basin is also of quite recent origin.

It consists of two fissures in the rock, in which the water boils

vigorously. But there is no mound, and the rocks of the fissure are just

beginning to get a coating of the silicious geyserite deposited from the

water, so that it cannot long have been spouting. Again, in the Grotto

Geyser--in the Upper Geyser Basin of Fire Hole River--the main or

larger crater is hollowed into fantastic arches, beneath which are

the grotto-like cavities from which it is named, which act as lateral

orifices for the escape of water during an eruption. It plays several

times in the course of the twenty-four hours, and sends a column of

water sixty feet high, the eruption lasting an hour. As yet, however,

the force of the water has not been sufficient, or of sufficiently long

duration, to break through the arches covering the basin or crater.

The Excelsior--claimed to be the largest of its order, which sent water

nearly 300 feet into the air at intervals of about five hours, and of

such volume as to wash away bridges over small streams below--was not,

until comparatively recent years, known as a specially powerful geyser.

But if it had for a time waned in importance, its immense crater, 330

feet in length and 200 feet at the widest part, shows that at a still

earlier date it was a gigantic fountain. In this deep pit, when the

breeze wafted aside the clouds of steam constantly arising from its

surface, the water could be seen seething 15 or 20 feet below the

surrounding level. Yet into the cauldron of boiling water a little

stream of cold water, from the melting snow of the uplands, ran

unceasingly. Since 1888 this great geyser has been inactive.

The Castle Geyser is so named on account of the fancied resemblance

which its mound of white and grey deposit presents to the ruins of a

feudal keep, the crater itself being placed on a cone or turret, which

has a somewhat imposing appearance compared with the other geysers in

the neighborhood. It throws a column usually about fifty or sixty feet

high, at intervals of two or three hours, but sometimes the discharge

shoots up much higher.

The Giant, in the Upper Geyser Basin, has a peculiar crater, which

has been likened to the stump of a hollow sycamore tree of gigantic

proportions, whose top has been wrenched off by a storm. This curious

cup is broken down at one side, as though it had been torn away during

an eruption of more than ordinary violence, and on this side the visitor

is able to look into the crater, if he can contrive to avoid the jets

which are constantly spouted from it. The periods of rest which it takes

are varied, an eruption often not occurring for several days at a time;

yet when it breaks out it continues playing for more than three hours,

with a volume of water reaching a height of from 130 to 140 feet. In the

interval little spouts are constantly in progress. Mr. Stanley saw one

eruption which he calculated to have shot a column of water to the

height of more than 200 feet. At first it seemed as though the geyser

was only making a feint, the discharge which preceded the great one

being merely repeated several times, followed by a cessation both of

the rumbling noises and of the ejection of water. But soon, after a

premonitory cloud of steam, the geyser began to work in earnest,

the column discharged rising higher and higher, until it reached the

altitude mentioned.

“At first it appeared to labor in raising the immense volume, which

seemed loath to start on its heavenward tour; but it was with perfect

ease that the stupendous column was held to its place, the water

breaking into jets and returning in glittering showers to the basin.

The steam ascended in dense volumes for thousands of feet, when it

was freighted on the wings of the winds and borne away in clouds. The

fearful rumble and confusion attending it were as the sound of distant

artillery, the rushing of many horses to battle, or the roar of a

fearful tornado. It commenced to act at 2 P. M., and continued for an

hour and a half, the latter part of which it emitted little else than

steam, rushing upward from its chambers below, of which, if controlled,

there was enough to run an engine of wonderful power. The waving to and

fro of such a gigantic fountain, when the column is at its height,

‘Tinselled o’er in robes of varying hues,’

and glistening in the bright sunlight, which adorns it with the glowing

colors of many a gorgeous rainbow, affords a spectacle so wonderful

and grandly magnificent, so overwhelming to the mind, that the ablest

attempt at description gives the reader who has never witnessed such a

display but a feeble idea of its glory.”

A DESCRIPTION OF THE GEYSER AT WORK

The only other geysers in this remarkable geyserland which we can spare

room to notice are those known as the Giantess, the Beehive, and the

Grand. The Giantess sends a column of water to the height of 250 feet.

An eruption is usually divided into three periods--two preliminary

efforts and a final one, divided from each other by intervals of between

one and two hours, while the intervals of discharge are very long.

Sometimes it does not play for several weeks. The Beehive, which is 400

feet from the Giantess, gets its name from the peculiar beehive-like

cone which it has formed. The eruption is also almost unique. It is

heralded by a slight escape of steam, which is followed by a column of

steam and water, shooting to the height of over 200 feet. The column

is somewhat fan-shaped, but it does not fall in rain, the spray being

evaporated and carried off as steam--if, indeed, there is not more steam

than water in the column. The duration of the discharge is between four

and five minutes, and the interval between two eruptions from twenty-one

to twenty-five hours.

The Grand is one of the most important in the Upper Geyser basin. Yet,

unlike the Grotto, the Giant, or the Old Faithful,--so called from its

frequent and regular eruptions--it has no raised cone or crater, and a

much less cavernous bowl than the Giantess and other geysers. The column

discharged ascends to the height of from eighty to two hundred feet, and

the eruptions last from fifteen minutes to three-quarters of an hour,

with intervals on an average of from seven to twenty hours. This

fountain is apparently very irregular in its action, though it is just

possible that when the Yellowstone geysers have been more consecutively

studied, it will be found that these seeming irregularities depend on

the varying supplies of water at different times of the year.

THE MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS

The marvellous phenomena of the Yellowstone region are not confined

to geyser action, hot springs of steady flow being, as above stated,

exceedingly numerous. Of these the most striking are those known as the

Mammoth Hot Springs, whose waters find their way through underground

passages, finally flowing from an opening as the “Boiling River,” which

empties into the Gardiner River.

These springs are marvels of beauty. Their terraced bowls, adorned with

delicate fret-work, are among the finest specimens of Nature’s handiwork

in the world, and the colored waters themselves are startling in their

brilliancy. Red, pink, black, canary, green, saffron, blue, chocolate,

and all their intermediate gradations are found here in exquisite

harmony. The springs rise in terraces of various heights and widths,

having intermingled with their delicate shades chalk-like cliffs, soft

and crumbly, these latter being the remains of springs from which the

life and beauty have departed. The great spring is the largest in the

country, the water flowing through three openings into a basin forty

feet long by twenty-five feet wide. From this the hot mineral waters

drip over into lower basins, of gracefully curved and scalloped outline,

the minerals deposited on the lips of the basin forming stalagmites of

variegated hue, yielding a brilliant and beautiful effect. The terraced

basins bear a close resemblance to the former New Zealand pink and white

terraces, and since the annihilation of the latter are the most charming

examples in existence of this rare form of Nature’s artistic handiwork.