DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.6094#0138
SICILY AND MALTA. 115
and ruining every thing it met with in its
course. Our conductors mewed us the
traces of this torrent, which are st ill very
visible; but are now beginning to recover
verdure and vegetation, which for some
time appeared to have been lost. The track
it has left, seems to be about a mile and
a half broad; and in some places slill
more.
The common opinion, I find, is, that
this water was raised by the power of suc-
tion, through some communication be-
twixt the volcano and the sea; the absur-
dity of which is too glaring to need a re-
futation. The power of sudtion alone, even
supposing a perfect: vacuum, could never
raise water to more than thirty-three or
thirty four feet, which is equal to the
weight of a column of air the whole height
of the atmosphere. But this circumstance,
I should imagine, might be easily enough
accounted for; either by a stream of lava
I 2 falling
and ruining every thing it met with in its
course. Our conductors mewed us the
traces of this torrent, which are st ill very
visible; but are now beginning to recover
verdure and vegetation, which for some
time appeared to have been lost. The track
it has left, seems to be about a mile and
a half broad; and in some places slill
more.
The common opinion, I find, is, that
this water was raised by the power of suc-
tion, through some communication be-
twixt the volcano and the sea; the absur-
dity of which is too glaring to need a re-
futation. The power of sudtion alone, even
supposing a perfect: vacuum, could never
raise water to more than thirty-three or
thirty four feet, which is equal to the
weight of a column of air the whole height
of the atmosphere. But this circumstance,
I should imagine, might be easily enough
accounted for; either by a stream of lava
I 2 falling