About a mile from the bungalow is a hill called Nishani Goodda or Cairn Hill, from the top of which a magnificent view of the surrounding country is got. To the east lie the table-lands of the Deccan and Mysore, the flat expanse broken here and there by an occasional hill. North and south stretches the chain of the Ghauts, rising peak after peak as far as the eye can see (Koda Chadri, where the Siruvatti rises, being very conspicuous); while to the west one looks down on the lowlands of jungle-covered Canara, with glimpses of the river here and there, and beyond them gleams the Indian Ocean.
The bungalow book in which visitors inscribe their names is very interesting reading. The records go back to 1840, and many travellers have written a record of what they did when there; while a few, inspired by the scene, have expressed their feelings in poetry, some of it well worth copying and preserving by any one who has seen the falls.
Chambers’ Journal (London, 1896).
ETNA
(SICILY)
ALEXANDRE DUMAS
The word Etna, according to the savants, is a Phœnician word meaning the mouth of the furnace. The Phœnician language, as you see, was of the order of that one spoken of by Covielle to the Bourgeois Gentilhomme, which expressed many things in a few words. Many poets of antiquity pretend that it was the spot where Deucalion and Pyrrha took refuge during the flood. Upon this score, Signor Gemellaro, who was born at Nicolosì, may certainly claim the honour of having descended in a direct line from one of the first stones which they threw behind them. That would leave, as you see, the Montmorencys, the Rohans, and the Noailles, far behind.
Homer speaks of Etna, but he does not designate it a volcano. Pindar calls it one of the pillars of the sky. Thucydides mentions three great explosions, from the epoch of the arrival of the Grecian colonies up to his own lifetime. Finally, there were two eruptions in the time of Denys; then they followed so rapidly that only the most violent ones have been counted.[10]
Since the eruption of 1781, Etna has had some little desire to overthrow Sicily; but, as these caprices have not had serious results, Etna may be is permitted to stand upon what it has accomplished—it is unique in its self-respect—and to maintain its eminence as a volcano.
Of all these eruptions, one of the most terrible was that of 1669. As the eruption of 1669 started from Monte Rosso, and as Monte Rosso is only half a mile to the left of Nicolosì, we took our way, Jadin and I, to visit the crater, after having promised Signor Gemellaro to come to dinner with him.