The wonders of the world

by John Loraine Abbott

MOUNT ETNA.

“Now under sulphurous Cuma’s sea-bound coast,

And vast Sicilia, lies the shaggy breast

Of snowy Etna, nurse of endless frost,

The pillared prop of heaven, forever pressed:

Forth from whose sulph’rous caverns issuing rise

Pure liquid fountains of tempestuous fire,

Which vail in ruddy mists the noonday skies,

While wrapt in smoke the eddying flames aspire,

Or gleaming through the night with hideous roar,

Far o’er the redd’ning main huge rocky fragments pour.

“But he, Vulcanian monster, to the clouds

The fiercest, hottest inundations throws,

While, with the burthen of incumbent woods,

And Etna’s gloomy cliffs o’erwhelmed he glows.

There on his flinty bed outstretch’d he lies,

Whose pointed rock his tossing carcass wounds;

There with dismay he strikes beholding eyes,

Or frights the distant ear with horrid sounds.”—West.

Mount Etna, one of the most majestic of all the volcanoes, which the ancients considered as one of the highest mountains in the world, and on the summit of which they believed that Deucalion and Pyrrha sought refuge, to save themselves from the universal deluge, is situated on the plain of Catania, in Sicily.

Its elevation above the level of the sea has been estimated at ten thousand, nine hundred and sixty-three feet, or upward of two miles. On clear days it is distinctly seen from Valetta, the capital of Malta, a distance of one hundred and fifty miles. It is incomparably the largest burning mountain in Europe. From its sides other mountains arise, which, in different ages, have been ejected in single masses from its enormous crater. The most extensive lavas of Vesuvius do not exceed seven miles in length, while those of Etna extend to fifteen, twenty, and some even to thirty miles. The crater of Etna is seldom less than a mile in circuit, and sometimes is two or three miles; but the circumference of the Vesuvian crater is never more than half a mile, even when widely distended, in its most destructive conflagrations. And, lastly, the earthquakes occasioned by these adjacent volcanoes, their eruptions, their showers of ignited stones, and the destruction and desolation which they create, are severally proportionate to their respective dimensions.

CRATER OF MOUNT ETNA.

A journey up Etna is considered as an enterprise of importance, as well from the difficulty of the route, as from the distance, it being thirty miles from Catania to the summit of the mountain. Its gigantic bulk, its sublime elevation, and the extensive, varied, and grand prospects which are presented from its summit, have, however, induced the curious in every age to ascend and examine it; and not a few have transmitted, through the press, the observations which they have made during their arduous journey. From its vast base it rises like a pyramid to the perpendicular hight of two miles, by an acclivity nearly equal on all sides, forming with the horizon an angle of about fifteen degrees, which becomes greater on approaching the crater; but the inclination of the steepest part of the cone nowhere exceeds an angle of forty-five degrees. This prodigious volcano may be compared to a forge, which, in proportion to the violence of the fire, to the nature of the fossil matters on which it acts, and of the gases which urge and set it in motion, produces, destroys, and reproduces, a variety of forms; and of this, as of all active volcanoes, we may say in the language of Young,

“The dread volcano ministers to good;

Its smothered flames might undermine the world

Loud Etnas fulminate in love to man.”

The top of Etna being above the common region of vapors, the heavens, at this elevation, appear with an unusual splendor. Brydone and his company observed, as they ascended in the night, that the number of the stars seemed to be infinitely increased, and the light of each was brighter than usual. The whiteness of the milky way was like a pure flame which spread across the heavens; and, with the naked eye, they could observe clusters of stars which were invisible from below. They likewise noticed several of those meteors called falling stars, which appeared as much elevated here as when viewed from the plain beneath.

This single mountain contains an epitome of the different climates throughout the world, presenting at once all the seasons of the year, and all the varieties of produce. It is accordingly divided into three distinct zones or regions, which may be distinguished as the torrid, temperate, and frigid, but which are known by the names of the cultivated region, the woody or temperate region, and the frigid or desert region. The former of these extends through twelve miles of the ascent toward the summit, and is almost incredibly abundant in pastures and fruit-trees of every description. It is covered with towns, villages and monasteries; and the number of inhabitants spread over its surface is estimated at one hundred and twenty thousand. In ascending to the woody or temperate region, the scene changes; it is a new climate, a new creation. Below, the heat is suffocating; but here, the air is mild and fresh. The turf is covered with aromatic plants; and the gulfs, which formerly ejected torrents of fire, are changed into woody valleys. Nothing can be more picturesque than this; the inequality of the soil displaying every moment some variety of scene: here, the ash and flowering thorns form domes of verdure; and there, the chestnut-trees grow to an enormous size. The one called castagno de cento cavilli, according to Brydone and Glover, has a circumference of two hundred and four feet. Many of the oaks also are of a prodigious size. Mr. Swinburne measured one which had a circumference of twenty-eight feet. The last, or desert region, commences more than a mile above the level of the sea. The lower part is covered with snow in winter only; but on the upper half of this sterile district the snows continually lie.

THE “CASTANO DE CENTO CAVILLI,” OR GREAT CHESTNUT TREE OF MOUNT ETNA.

The cone of Etna is, in a right line, about a mile in ascent. The crater is about a mile and a half in circumference; and from the inner part of this, a column of smoke constantly rises; while the liquid fiery matter may be seen rolling, rising and falling within. As to the vastness and beauty of the prospect from the summit of Etna, all writers agree that it is probably unsurpassed. M. Houel was there at sunrise, when the horizon was perfectly clear, and the coast of Calabria, as seen in the distance, appeared to the eye misty, and undistinguishable from the sea. The sky above was specked with the light floating clouds that are so often seen in that delightful climate before the rising of the sun; and in the calm silence all nature seemed waiting the coming of the orb of day. And very soon the promise thus given began to be fulfilled. In a short time a fiery radiance appeared in the east. The fleecy clouds were tinged with purple; the atmosphere became strongly illuminated, and, reflecting the rays of the sun, seemed to be filled with a bright refulgence of flame. Although the heavens were thus enlightened, the sea still retained its dark azure, and the fields and forests did not yet reflect the rays of the sun. The gradual rising of this luminary, however, soon diffused light over the hills which lie below the peak of Etna. This last stood like an island in the midst of the ocean, with luminous points multiplying every moment around, and spreading over a wider extent with the greatest rapidity. It was, he said, as if the world had been observed suddenly to spring from the night of non-existence.

“Ere the rising sun

Shone o’er the deep, or ’mid the vault of night

The moon her silver lamp suspended; ere

The vales with springs were watered, or with groves

Of oak or pine the ancient hills were crowned;

Then the Great Spirit, whom his works adore,

Within his own deep essence viewed the forms,

The forms eternal of created things:

The radiant sun; the moon’s nocturnal lamp;

The mountains and the streams: the ample stores

Of earth, of heaven, of nature. From the first,

On that full scene his love divine he fixed,

His admiration. Till, in time complete,

What he admired and loved, his vital power

Unfolded into being. Hence the breath

Of life, informing each organic frame;

Hence the green earth, and wild resounding waves;

Hence light and shade, alternate; warmth and cold;

And bright autumnal skies, and vernal showers,

And all the fair variety of things.”—Akenside.

The most sublime object, however, which the summit of Etna presents, is the immense mass of its own colossal body. Its upper region exhibits rough and craggy cliffs, rising perpendicularly, fearful to the view, and surrounded by an assemblage of fugitive clouds, to increase the wild variety of the scene. Amid the multitude of woods in the middle or temperate region, are numerous mountains, which, in any other situation, would appear of a gigantic size, but which, compared to Etna, are mere mole-hills. Lastly, the eye contemplates with admiration the lower region, the most extensive of the three, adorned with elegant villas and castles, verdant hills and flowery fields, and terminated by the extensive coast, where to the south stands the beautiful city of Catania, to which the waves of the neighboring sea serve as a mirror.

Etna has been celebrated as a volcano from the remotest antiquity. Eruptions are recorded by Diodorus Siculus, as having happened five hundred years before the Trojan war, or sixteen hundred and ninety-three years before the Christian era.

“Etna roars with dreadful ruins nigh,

Now hurls a bursting cloud of cinders high,

Involved in smoky whirlwinds to the sky;

With loud displosion to the starry frame,

Shoots fiery globes, and furious floods of flame:

Now from her bellowing caverns burst away

Vast piles of melted rocks in open day.

Her shattered entrails wide the mountain throws,

And deep as hell her flaming center glows.”—Warton.

In 1669, the torrent of burning lava inundated a space fourteen miles in length, and four in breadth, burying beneath it part of Catania, till at length it precipitated itself into the sea. For several months before the lava broke out, the old mouth, or great crater of the summit, was observed to send forth much smoke and flame, and the top had fallen in, so that the mountain was much lowered.

Eighteen days before, the sky was very thick and dark, with thunder, lightning, frequent concussions of the earth, and dreadful subterraneous bellowings. On the eleventh of March, about sunset, an immense gulf opened in the mountain, into which when stones were thrown, they could not be heard to strike the bottom. Ignited rocks, fifteen feet in length, were hurled to the distance of a mile; while others of a smaller size were carried three miles. During the night, the red-hot lava burst out of a vineyard twenty miles below the great crater, and ascended into the air to a considerable hight. In its course, it destroyed five thousand habitations, and filled up a lake several fathoms deep. It shortly after reached Catania, rose over the walls, whence it ran for a considerable length into the sea, forming a safe and beautiful harbor, which was, however, soon filled up by a similar torrent of inflamed matter. This is the stream, the hideous deformity of which, devoid of vegetation, still disfigures the south and western borders of Catania, and on which part of the noble modern city is built.

The showers of scoriæ and sand which, after a lapse of two days, followed this eruption, formed a mountain called Monte Rosso, having a base of about two miles, and a perpendicular hight of seven hundred and fifty feet. On the twenty-fifth, the whole mountain, even to the most elevated peak, was agitated by a tremendous earthquake. The highest crater of Etna, which was one of the loftiest parts of the mountain, then sunk into the volcanic gulf, and in the place which it had occupied, there now appeared nothing but a wide gulf, more than a mile in extent, from which issued enormous quantities of smoke, ashes and stones.

In 1809, twelve new craters opened about half-way down the mountain, and threw out rivers of burning lava, by which several estates were covered to the depth of thirty or forty feet; and during three or four successive nights, a very large river of red-hot lava was distinctly seen, in its whole extent, running down from the mountain.

In 1811, several mouths opened on the eastern side of the mountain: being nearly in the same line, and at equal distances, they presented to the view a striking spectacle; torrents of burning matter, discharged with the greatest force from the interior of the volcano, illuminated the horizon to a great extent. An immense quantity of matter, which was driven to considerable distances, was discharged from these apertures, the largest of which continued for several months to emit torrents of fire. Even at the time when it had the appearance of being choked, there suddenly issued from it clouds of ashes, which descended, in the form of rain, on the city of Catania and its environs, as well as on the fields situated at a very considerable distance. A roaring, resembling that of a sea in the midst of a tempest, was heard to proceed from the interior of the mountain; and this sound, accompanied from time to time by dreadful explosions, resembling thunder, reëchoed through the valleys, and spread terror on every side.