enormous mass of hot cinders and dust, rushing upwards to the height of some hundred feet, with a loud roaring noise, then falling into the sea on all sides with a still louder noise, arising in part, perhaps, from the formation of prodigious quantities of steam, which instantly took place. This steam was at first of a brown colour, having embodied a great deal of dust; as it rose it gradually recovered its pure white colour, depositing the dust in the shape of a shower of muddy rain. While this was being accomplished, renewed eruptions of hot cinders and dust were quickly succeeding each other, while forked lightning, accompanied by rattling thunder, darted about in all directions within the column, now darkened with dust and greatly increased in volume, and distorted by sudden gusts and whirlwinds. The latter were most frequent on the lee side, where they often made imperfect water-spouts of curious shapes. On one occasion some of the steam reached the boat; it smelt a little of sulphur, and the mud it left became a gritty sparkling dark brown powder when dry. None of the stones or cinders thrown out appeared more than half a foot in diameter, and most of them much smaller.
“From the time when the volcano was first seen till after I left it, the barometer did not fall or rise; the sympiesometer underwent frequent but not important changes, and the temperature of the sea did not bespeak any unusual influence.
“After sunset, on the 18th, soundings were tried for every hour, to the average depth of eighty fathoms, no bottom. The wind was N.W., the weather serene.
“On the forenoon of the 19th, with the centre of the volcano bearing by compass S. by W. ½ W. one mile distant, good sights, for the chronometer gave the longitude 12° 41' East; and at noon on the same day, when it bore W. by N. ½ N. by compass, the meridian altitude of the sun gave the latitude 37° 7' 30" North; an amplitude of the sun the same morning gave the variation of 1½ point westerly. It is worthy of remark, that on the 28th of June last, at 9-30 p.m., when passing near the same spot in company with the Britannia, several shocks of an earthquake were felt in both ships. I have the honor to be, &c.
The appearance of this volcanic island, in Aug. 1831, is thus described by Mr. Alick Osborne, surgeon of the Ganges 84, Captain George Burdett:–
