DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1082#0102
66 FOMPEIANA.
From him we learn, that the lava does
not always issue from the crater; in 1766,
it burst forth from a spot half a mile
lower down, the adjacent ground quiver-
ing like the timbers of a windmill. The
inflamed matter was so intensely hot at the
source, as to prevent a nearer approach
than ten feet, yet its toughness was such
that a stone of considerable magnitude,
when thrown upon its surface, made but
a slight impression, and was borne on
by the current. Sometimes it issues like
glass in fusion; at others, assumes a more
farinaceous appearance, and comes out as
meal from the grindstone; but its rapidity
soon abates, and the extended surface
becomes more sluggish, and is spotted with
detached cooling portions, which increase
until the whole at length becomes a mere
heap of stones resembling a ploughed field
or boisterous sea arrested by a sudden
frost. On cooling, which is an operation
From him we learn, that the lava does
not always issue from the crater; in 1766,
it burst forth from a spot half a mile
lower down, the adjacent ground quiver-
ing like the timbers of a windmill. The
inflamed matter was so intensely hot at the
source, as to prevent a nearer approach
than ten feet, yet its toughness was such
that a stone of considerable magnitude,
when thrown upon its surface, made but
a slight impression, and was borne on
by the current. Sometimes it issues like
glass in fusion; at others, assumes a more
farinaceous appearance, and comes out as
meal from the grindstone; but its rapidity
soon abates, and the extended surface
becomes more sluggish, and is spotted with
detached cooling portions, which increase
until the whole at length becomes a mere
heap of stones resembling a ploughed field
or boisterous sea arrested by a sudden
frost. On cooling, which is an operation