Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 20.djvu/250

VOLAPUK. 202 VOLCANO. sounds not allowed in the scheme. Thus for 'house' the Latin domus is taken, reduced to dom (pronounced dom) ; for 'time' the English time, reduced to tim (pronounced tim) ; for 'teaching' the English teach (titsh), reduced to tit and al- tered to tid (pronounced tid). The words are often disguised beyond recognition, as kud (Eng- lish cause), dam (German Dank), nam (Latin maiius). All stems except particles must end in a consonant. To these are added many inflexive and formative endings, and some prefixes. In nouns the ending a indicates the genitive, e the dative, and i the accusative {dom, doma, dome, domi ) . The verb formations are rather numerous. The six vowels a ii e i o u indicate the six tenses. Passive forms begin pa-, pii-, etc. Prepositions are used to supplement inflexions (a, bei, de, ho, etc.). Throughout, synthesis, as in Latin and Greek, is the rule, and cumulation is the re- sult. Polysyllables abound. As the radical words are mostly reduced to a single syllable, the stem is often liidden in the built-up form. The first aspect of Volapiik is therefore much like that of an entirely strange language, with noth- ing to appeal at once to the memory or the im- agination. The dictionary and grammar must be consulted at every word, until the words and forms are memorized. Volapiik was first published in 1879. It soon found disciples and promoters in Germany, Aus- tria, France, Holland, the United States, and other coimtrics. International congresses were held (1884, 1887, 1889), directors were chosen, I an academy or governing council was formed (1887), and resolutions and statutes were adopt- ed. The second stage soon arrived. Proposals for the improvement or extension of the s_y.stem were at first decided by the academy, with a right of veto conceded to the inventor. But the apparatus became unwieldy : change was hindered, the acade- micians became restive, and dissensions increased. Individual reforms of the scheme were published by dissatisfied Volapiikists ; and independent in- ventors put fortli new schemes of their own. The adherents of Volapiik in its first form fell off, and the whole movement almost collapsed. But a number of the leaders continued their efforts and debates, and at length, w-ith a re- organized academy, under the directorship of Woldcmar Rosenberger (1893-98) and the Rev. M. A. F. Holmes (1898-1903). formed what is practically a new system, very different in vocab- ulary and inflection from Volapiik, called Lin-pu international, or specifically Idiom nrntral, 'the neutral language.' Consult: Sclileyer, Bntimirf eincT WeUsprachc (Sigmaringen. 1879) ; Wijrter- buck (Constance, 18.80; 4th ed. 1888); Kirch- holfs, Dictionnaire imlapiik-frani^ais et francais- volapiik (Paris, 1887) ; id., Le Volapiik (ib., 1886 et seq.) ; Bornbusch, Abridr/rd Urammar of Vola- piik (trans, from Kirchhoff's, 1887) ; Sprague, The International Lanffuatic: Handbook of Volapiik (New York. 1888) ; Hain, Orammar of Volapiik (London, 1888). See Universal Language. VOLCANIC BRECCIA. See Tuff. VOLCANO. .s most generally iinderstood, a volcano is a niointain which in a period of activity throws out molten or other material from the earth's interior, this material, taken collectively for all volcanoes, being lava (or its disrupted parts, scoria>, or cinders and athes), steam, and various gases — sulphurous, sulphuret- ed hydrogen, hydrocliloric, methane, etc. There is no limitation as to the size (in height or di- ameter) of the "mountain;' therefore, volcanoes vary from small hillocks to giant excrescences of the earth's surface, many of its loftiest sum- mits (as Orizaba and Popocatepetl, in Mexico; Colopaxi and Aconcagua, in the Andes; Kiliman- jaro, in East Central Africa ; Demavend and Ar- arat, in the Caspian region of Asia — between 17,000 and 23,000 feet in altitude) being of a volcanic nature. Indeed, it would seem that the greater part of the mass of most volcanoes is built up of the materials which the volcanoes throw out. Therefore, in youth these mountains are small, and they develop in size as the erup- tions continue in time and magnitude. The size of a volcano is, however, in no way a measure of the force of its activity, unless, perhaps, one may assume the reverse proposition of what is very generally believed. Many of the most violent or paroxysmic and destructive eruptions are those which have taken place from comparatively low volcanoes, like Vesuvius, Skaptar Jijkull, in Ice- land, the Soufrifere of Saint Vincent, Coseguina in Nicaragua. Krakatoa in the Sunda Sea, Ban- dai-San in Japan, and Pelfe on the island of Martinique, mountains measuring only a few thousand feet in height. The Part!? of a Volcano. It is customary to recognize as the fundamental parts of a volcano: the basal portion or mountain proper; a more steeply rising and conical portion, or 'cone;' and the pit or basin-shaped depression found on the summit of most active volcanoes and known as the crater — the seat of eruptivity. There is no sharp or fast line delimiting these parts or making them necessary parts of a volcano, for in many there is no separation between the cone and the base proper — or the whole mountain might be said to be the cone —and in some volcanoes eruption takes place without any opened crater (Giorgios, in Santorin, 1800, Pelee, and some of the ancient puys of Central France), ^'hen present, and it is most generally present, the crater occupies a position on the actual summit of the mountain, but its true relation is frequently masked by the breaking away of a portion of the crater-wall, when the caldron appears sub-central or lateral, with its base a consideral)le distance down the slope of the volcano. True lateral craters or 'craterlets' are formed when the main mountain has broken out over its surface supplemental or 'parasitic' cones, which are sometimes very numerous, as in the case of Etna. The persistently active Kilauea, situated at the 4000-foot level on the slojie of Mauna Loa, is a supplemental crater of that vol- cano, but its activit.y is mostly, if not entirely, in- dependent of the mountain on which it is para- sitieally placed. The size of the crater bears no relation to the height of the mountain carrying it. Orizaba, three and a half miles high, has a crater less than 1000 feet in diameter: the cr.ater of Popocatepetl is hardly more than double that size. On the other hand, Haleakla, a Hawaiian volcano on the island of Maui, 10.000 feet in height, has a crater (seemingly the largest in (he world) 20 miles in circumference: and the ancient crater surrounding .Vso-San, 5030 feet, in Japan, is