The favourable circumstance of having this aperture immediately under my view induced me to throw into it some large stones, by rolling them down the steep declivity below me. These stones, which were only large pieces of lava that I had detached from the edges of the crater, bounding down the side, in a few moments fell on the bottom, and those which entered into the aperture, and struck the liquid lava, produced a sound similar to that they would have occasioned had they fallen into a thick tenacious paste. Every stone I thus threw struck against and loosened others in its passage, which fell with it, and in like manner struck and detached others in their way, whence the sounds produced were considerably multiplied. The stones which fell on the bottom rebounded, even when they were very large, and returned a sound different from that I have before described. The bottom cannot, therefore, be considered as only a thin crust; since, were it not thick and solid, it must have been broken by stones so heavy falling from so great a height.

To satisfy one emotion of curiosity, is frequently to excite another. I had, at first, approached this volcano with a kind of superstitious awe. The histories of every age, the relations of travellers, the universal voice of Europe, had all contributed to inspire those who should adventure to visit it with dread: but as at this time it seemed to have laid aside its terrors, and was in a state of perfect calmness and tranquillity, I was encouraged to become more fami❤ liar, and to endeavour to pry into more of its secrets. I have already observed that the side of the crater to the west is of a more gentle declivity than the others; and I, therefore, conceived that this might serve me as a ladder to descend to the bottom; where I might have added to the observations I had already made, other novel and important facts. But the persons whom I had brought with me as guides would not consent that I should expose myself to such danger. They could not, however, prevent me from making, at my ease, the observations I have here published, and walking leisurely about the summit of the mountain, notwithstanding the dangerous consequences with which they threatened me; telling me that, should the wind change, the column of smoke must be turned towards us, and might deprive us of life by its pestilential fumes; that, besides, we were not certain that the lava at the bottom, which

now appeared so calm and still, would long remain in the same state; but that it was possible, from circumstances difficult to foresee, that it might be thrown up on a sudden, and punish our imprudent curiosity by burying us beneath the fiery ruin; in support of which suggestion they produced several instances of sudden and most unexpected eruptions.

We have seen above, that there were two columns of smoke arising from tua. It is to be remarked that, besides that point of Mount Etna on which I stood, there is another to the north, a quarter of a mile higher; and which renders the summit of Etna properly bifurcated. Within the first prominence is sunk the crater I have described; and on the side of the other is the second, from which ascends a lesser column of smoke. The second crater is smaller by about the one-half than that I have already described; and the one is separated from the other only by a partition of scoria and accumulated lava, which lies in the direction of from east to west. I made my observations on this second crater from a small distance; but it was impossible to advance to it, on account of the numerous and thick streams of smoke by which it was surrounded. This, however, was no great disappointment, after having seen and examined the principal crater, which is that, whence several currents of lava had issued in 1787. I ought, certainly, to consider myself as extremely fortunate, in being able to gratify my curiosity with so near and distinct a view of the objects I have described; as the guides assured me, that, among all the times when they had conducted strangers to the summit of Etna, this was the only one in which they had a clear and undisturbed view of the internal parts of that immense gulph. After my return to Catania, the Chevalier Gioeni likewise declared to me that, in all his different excursions to that mountain, he had never had a good fortune. similar to mine; and that, a month before my arrival, he had made a journey to Etna, with the Chevalier Dangios, furnished with the necessary instruments to ascertain accurately the height of the mountain; but when they had arrived at the foot of the cone, where they had proposed to begin their operations, they were obliged to return back from the obstacles they met with, which, to say the truth, are comonly neither few nor small.

Etna rises to a prodigious height above the level of the sea, and

its summit is usually covered with snows and ice, and obscured with clouds, except when the latter are low and range along the sides. The winds, likewise, frequently blow with such violence that persons can scarcely keep their feet, not to mention the acute cold which benumbs the limbs. But the most formidable impediments to the progress of the adventurers who attempt this perilous journey, are the streams of sulphureons vapour which rise on the sides, and the thick clouds of sulphureous smoke which burst forth from the mouth of the volcano, even when not in a state of agitation. It seems as if nature had placed these noxious fumes as a guard to Etna, and other fiery mountains, to prevent the approach of curiosity, and secure her mysterious and wondrous labours from discovery. I should, however, justly incur the reproach of being ungrate ful, were I not to acknowledge the generous partiality she appeared to manifest towards me. At the time I made my visit, the sky was clear, the mountain free from snows, the temperature of the atmosphere not incommodious, the thermometer standing at seven degrees above the freezing point (foriy eight degrees of Fahrenheit), and the wind favouring my design, by driving the smoke of thecrater from me, which otherwise would alone have been sufficient to have frustrated all my attempts. The streams of smoke I met with in my way were, indeed, somewhat troublesome, but they might have been much more so; though, had our guides conducted us by another road, as, on my return to Catania, I found they might have done, we should have escaped this incon venience.

It here will not be improper to compare these observations on the crater of Etna with those of Baron Riedesel, Sir William Hamilton, Mr. Brydone, and Count Borch; as such a comparison will shew the great changes which have taken place in this volcano, within the space of twenty years; that is, from the time when it was visited by Baron Riedesel, in 1767, to that of my journey, in 1788. At the time when that traveller made his observations, the crater was enlarged towards the east, with an aperture which now no longer exists. He has not given the measure of its circuit, nor has he mentioned the interior aspect of the crater; probably because he had not seen it, having been, as I imagine, prevented by the quantity of smoke which, he tells us, continually ascended from it.

It is worthy of notice, however, that at that time there was not at the bottom of the crater the hard flat surface I have described ; since the stones thrown into it did not return the smallest sound. Within the gulph itself, was heard a noise similar to that of the waves of the sea when agitated by a tempest, which noise, probably proceeded from the lava within the bowels of the mountain, liquefied and in motion. We may hence conceive how easily a volcano may begin to rage on a sudden, though before apparently in a state of complete tranquillity; for if we suppose a superabundant quantity of elastic substances to have been suddenly developed in the liquid lava of Etna, either at the time when Baron Riedesel visited the crater, or when I observed it in a state of slight commotion within the gulf, it must immediately have swelled in every part, beating violently against the sides of the caverns in which it was imprisoned, thundered among the deep cavities, and, bursting forth through the sides, have poured out a river of fire; or, should its violence have been there resisted, it would have rushed up within the crater, until it overflowed its brink, and deluged the sides of the mountains with its torrents.

Sir William Hamilton, on the 26th of October 1769, arrived at the summit of Etua, with great difficulty, on account of the snows he met with in his way, the severity of the atmosphere, the sulphureous vapours, and the violence of the wind. He was unable to view distinctly the lower parts of the crater, being prevented by the great quantity of smoke which issued from it; though, when this smoke was sometimes driven away by the wind, he could discover that the crater was shaped like a funnel, diminishing until it ended in a point; and that this funnel was incrusted over with salt and sulphur. The crater was two miles and a half in circumference.

From the time, therefore, of the journey of Baron Riedesel to that of Sir William Hamilton, the crater must have undergone great changes in its structure; since, if the stones that were thrown into it gave no indications to the ear that they struck against any solid body, it is manifest that there must have been an abyss as well as a funnel ; and as the funnel terminated in a point, when it was observed by Sir William Hamilton, it is evident that the flat bottom I have described, and which was about two-thirds of a mile in circuit, did not then

The internal sides of the crater, Sir William tells us, were covered with a crust of salt and sulphur: but he does not specify the nature of the former; and though the presence of the latter is not improbable, he might have been led into a mistake by the yellow colour, and have taken the muriate of ammonia (sal ammoniac) for sulphur, as I did before I had examined it. Sir William has not told us that he made any examination at all; and it is probable that he judged only from the appearance it presented to his eye.

He observes, lastly, that the crater was two miles and a half in circumference; an estimate which may be made to agree with mine by neglecting the partition which separates the greater crater from the less, and considering them both as one. The sum of the two circumferences, according to the estimate I have given, would not then greatly differ from the measure of Sir William Hamilton, Nothing, likewise, can be more probable, than that among the various changes that have happened to Etna, this partition, by which the great crater is divided into two parts, has been produced.

Omitting the observation of Mr. Brydone, that "the tremendous gulf of Etna, so celebrated in all ages, has been looked upon as the terror both of this and another life, that inspires such awe and borror, that it is not surprising that it has been considered as the place of the damned;" and reflections of a similar kind which he has employed; and confining ourselves to what he actually saw on the 29th of May 1770, we learn from him that "the crater was then a circle of about three miles and a half in circumference; that it went shelving down on each side, and formed a regular hollow, like a vast amphitheatre; and that a great mouth opened near the centre*.

From the time of the journey of Sir William Hamilton, therefore, to that of the visit of Brydone, that is to say, within the short space of a year, various changes had happened to this volcano, by the enlargement of its crater, and a spacious aperture formed in its bottom.

Count Borch appears to have wished to exceed the three other travellers in brevity, relative to this subject: since he only tells us

* Brydone's Tour through Sicily and Malta, Vol. I. p. 195, 196.