It appears that the eruption of Coseguina was followed by violent earthquake shocks and other evidences of volcanic energy over extended regions. For example, there were fearful earthquakes along the Andes, the worst of which occurred on February 20th, and continued at the rate of three or four a day up to March 6th, and, less frequently, to March 17th. It was during one of these earthquakes that the city of Concepcion, Chile, was so completely destroyed, that but a single house remained.
The same brilliant sunsets and sunrises occurred in different parts of the world after the eruption of Coseguina, due to the presence of large quantities of volcanic dust that followed the great eruption of Krakatoa.
The cause of this great explosive eruption of Coseguina was most probably the same as that which is believed to have caused the eruption of Krakatoa, namely, a large volume of water suddenly gaining access to a mass of liquid lava.
Volcán del Fuego is another of the many volcanoes of Central America. It is situated as one of a group of volcanoes on the highest summit of the Isthmus. This volcanic mountain has a regular cone with regular slopes on all sides, except on the north, where a table-like projection, about 1,000 feet below the summit, is all that remains of a vast cone, the summit of which was blown away, according to Russell, in prehistoric times, just as was the crater of Somma on Vesuvius.
There have been in Central America, since the time of the Spanish conquest, some fifty volcanic eruptions sufficiently great to have been recorded. Some idea of the activity of Fuego during this time may be had from the fact that of all these eruptions some twenty were those of Fuego. At the present time, however, the volcano is dormant and apparently almost extinct.
The recorded eruptions of Fuego are nearly all of the explosive type. Among the most violent were those that occurred during 1526, 1541, and 1581. During 1582, 1585, and 1586, there were eruptions nearly every month, the most terrible being near Christmas day in 1586. Other memorable eruptions occurred in 1614, 1623, 1686, and 1705, and at other dates down to August 17th, 1860, from which date to the present time the volcano has been quiet.
We will conclude this brief description of the volcanoes of Central America with that of Volcán de Agua, or, as the word means, The Water Volcano. It is situated in Guatemala near the coast, and is one of the mountains that occupies the plateau on which Fuego is situated.
The Volcán de Agua is one of the most remarkable volcanoes in Central America, standing, as it does, nearly alone, and rising to an elevation of 3,350 metres (10,988 ft.), above the level of the sea. It has been extinct for a long time.
It has been supposed by some, from its name, that this is a volcano that throws out water. Others believe that the name comes from the water produced by the melting of the snow that is collected on the sides of the mountain. Now there almost always escapes from the craters of volcanoes during violent eruptions immense quantities of water vapor, which, condensing, fall as vast showers of rain that often deluge the surrounding country. In snow-clad mountains, the escape of lava is often attended by floods caused by the rapid melting of the snow. The water volcano did not, however, take its name from either of these facts, but rather because at the time of the Spanish invasion, the crater of the mountain was occupied by a large lake, and that during an earthquake in 1541 the wall of the crater was broken, when the lake was poured as an immense stream of water down the side of the mountain, overwhelming a village which was situated on this slope. That this was the correct origin of the same may be seen from the fact that the crater at the present time still shows the remains of its former lake basin, and that on the sides of the broken rim an immense ravine can be seen through which the water poured down on the village below.
Daubeny describes this volcano as follows: