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VIEW OF VESUVIUS AND VOLCANIC MOUNTAIN DISTRICT, 
 NEAR NAPLES. • 
 
I 
 
 i 
 
 i 
 
IrefEcc. 
 
 Britain, 
 
 lOLCANOES and Caverns are generally 
 reckoned amongst the greatest of the 
 wonders of Nature. The more ignor- 
 ant people are, the greater is the awe with which 
 they view them. The very names of some of 
 ^fhat are called the "wonders of nature" in 
 show that in the olden times, people 
 ^thought that the Evil One could play all sorts of 
 ^X) pranks with the fair works of Creation ; that he 
 "^could have holes, and cellars, and caves, and 
 '^chimneys just where he pleased, and with regard 
 ,to our subject, volcanoes were his chimneys, and 
 Xcaverns his lurking-places ! 
 
 ^ Thanks to the spread of knowledge, even chil- 
 dren now know that all Nature's works are 
 
 CM 
 
 wonders, and that in reality, there is no more 
 S wonder in the blazing of a volcano, than in the 
 ^ growth of a blade of grass. The volcano is as 
 
 297858 
 
vi 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 much part of the great Creator's work, as is the 
 gently purling brook ; it is necessary to render 
 the earth habitable, or it would not exist. 
 Nothing was created in vain, or as an object of 
 mere wonder. Such " wonders " of Nature as 
 ^volcanoes and caverns excite our curiosity because 
 they are not seen by us as often as we see other 
 works of Nature, which are no less w^onderful 
 because often seen. 
 
 A congreve, or lucifer match may produce more 
 destruction than the greatest volcano ; the little 
 brimstone tip of it might work more harm than 
 the most powerful crater could effect. A little 
 child could ignite a match, all the armies in the 
 world could not cause an eruption of a volcano. 
 
VOLCANOES AND CAVERNS. 
 
 ♦ 
 
 I.._VOLCANOES. 
 
 ULCAN was the Roman god of sub- 
 terraneous fire, and from him — an 
 imaginary being — ''burning moun- 
 tains " are called ''volcanoes." 
 
 There are more than three hundred 
 volcanoes ; of which more than a hundred 
 are in America, more than a hundred and 
 fifty are in Asia and Oceania ; there are 
 twenty- one in Europe, and eleven in Africa. 
 There may be many more in parts of the 
 earth of which we know nothing. 
 
 The greatest rivers, and the loftiest 
 mountains in the world, are in America, 
 
8 VOLCANOES, 
 
 and there also are the highest and mightiest 
 volcanoes. In your Geographj-book you 
 will find that the highest ground in 
 America is the summit of Aconcagua, an 
 extinct volcano, nearly 24,000 feet high. 
 It is one of the mountains of the great 
 Andean chain, in which there are many 
 other extinct volcanoes. 
 
 The loftiest of the volcanoes in the 
 Andes which have in modern times been 
 active, is Cotopaxi, wdiich is nearly 19,000 
 feet high. It is the loftiest burning moun- 
 tain in the world. If it were possible to 
 place Mount Vesuvius on the top of Mount 
 Etna, the summit of Vesuvius would still 
 be more than 4000 feet below that of 
 Cotopaxi 1 
 
 Cotopaxi is in the midst of the Andes, 
 and forty-one miles from Quito the- capital 
 of Ecuador. It is not only the loftiest and 
 most powerful volcano in the w^orld, but it 
 is also the most beautiful of all the lofty 
 mountains of the Andes. It is a perfect 
 
10 VOLCANOES. 
 
 cone, and it is covered nearly to the edge 
 of the crater with snow, which, at sunset, 
 shines with dazzling splendour. No one 
 has ever reached the brink of the crater, 
 and it is supposed that it is impossible for 
 any one to do so. 
 
 Its power is so great that it has thrown 
 out to a distance of nine miles, a block of 
 stone measuring one hundred and nine 
 cubic yards ! In the year 1738, its flames 
 rose nearly 3000 feet above the crater ; in 
 1744 its roaring was heard at a distance 
 of nearly seven hundred miles. In the 
 year 1803 its noise was heard, day and 
 night, like the firing of great guns, at a 
 distance of one hundred and eighty miles. 
 
 Stromboli is the most northern as well 
 as the most eastern of the Lipari Islands. 
 For more than two thousand years it has 
 been blazing, and has been, what it will 
 probably be for ages to come, the Light- 
 house of the Mediterranean. It is nearly 
 3000 feet high. 
 
VOLCANOES. 11 
 
 Dolomien, a celebrated French scholar, 
 who wrote a book called Voyage to the 
 Isles of Lipari in 1781/' saj^s, The in- 
 
 STROMBOLI. 
 
 flamed crater is on the north-western part 
 of the isle on the side of the mountain. I 
 saw it dart during the night, at regular 
 intervals of seven or eight minutes, ignited 
 stones which rose to the height of more 
 than 100 feet, forming rays a little diver- 
 
12 VOLCANOES. 
 
 gont, but of which the greater quantity 
 fell back into the crater, while others rolled 
 even to the sea." 
 
 He describes the crater as very small, 
 having the form of a funnel terminating in 
 a point. He says, During all the time I 
 observed it, the eruptions succeeded with the 
 same regularity as during the preceding 
 night. The approach of the eruption is not 
 announced by any noise or dull murmur 
 in the interior of the mountain, and it is 
 always with surprise that one sees the 
 stones darted into the air. There are 
 times when the eruption is more precipitate 
 and violent, and stones describing more 
 divergent rays are thrown into the sea at a 
 considerable distance." 
 
 The eruptions are more violent during 
 the winter seasons than during the summer. 
 
 Mount Etna is in the Island of Sicily. 
 The Sicilians call it Monte Gibello. It is 
 the first volcano mentioned by ancient 
 writers. It rises 10,000 feet above the 
 
VOLCANOES. 13 
 
 level of the sea, and it is about a hundred 
 and eighty miles in circumference. 
 
 In the year 1669 an eruption of Etna 
 destroyed fifteen towns and villages, and 
 
 MOUNT ETNA. 
 
 the stream of lava was so deep that it 
 flowed over the city wall of Catania, which 
 was sixty feet high. 
 
 Mount Vesuvius is in Naples. It is 
 nearly 4000 feet high. It is the only 
 active volcano on the continent of Europe. 
 
14 VOLCANOES. 
 
 All the others are on islands. By an erup- 
 tion of Vesuvius in the year 79, the cities 
 of Herculaneum and Pompeii were destroyed. 
 This eruption is the first on record, and 
 from what a Koman poet wrote respecting 
 it, we have every reason to believe that 
 for ages the mountain was noted only for 
 its fertility, and for the beauty of its sur- 
 rounding scenery. There is no city in 
 Europe so delightfully situated as Naples, 
 which is also the largest city in Italy. 
 Vesuvius is only eight miles distant from 
 it. 
 
 It is very singular that History which 
 records the existence of Herculaneum and 
 Pompeii, which tells us of the great eruption 
 of Vesuvius in the year 79, which says that 
 by that eruption Pliny, " the Martyr of 
 Nature," lost his life, is silent respecting 
 the destruction of Herculaneum and Pom- 
 peii. An eminent geologist referring to this, 
 says, ''When, in 1738, the workmen in 
 excavating a well, struck upon the theatre 
 
VOLCANOES. 15 
 
 of Herculaneum, which had been buried 
 for seventeen centuries beneath the lava of 
 Vesuvius; when subsequently (1750), 
 
 VESUVIUS. 
 
 Pompeii was disencumbered of its volcanic 
 ashes, and thus two ancient cities were 
 brought to light ; had history been as 
 silent respecting their existence as it was 
 of their destruction, would not all observers 
 say, and have not all actually said, " Here 
 are the works of man, his houses, furniture, 
 
16 VOLCANOES. 
 
 and personal ornaments; his verj^ wine and 
 food ; his dungeons, with skeletons of the 
 prisoners chained in their awful solitudes, 
 and here and there a victim overtaken by 
 the fiery storm ? Because the soil had 
 formed, and grass, and trees had overgrown, 
 and successive generations of men had erected 
 their abodes over the entombed cities, and 
 because these were covered with lava and 
 cinders, does any one hesitate to admit that 
 they were once real cities; that they stood 
 upon what was then the surface of the 
 country; that their streets once rang with 
 the noise of business ; their halls and 
 theatres with the voice of pleasure; and 
 that they were overwhelmed with the 
 eruptions of Vesuvius, and their places 
 blotted out from the earth, and forgotten'? 
 These inferences no one can dispute — all 
 agree in the conclusions to be drawn. 
 When, moreover, the traveller sees the 
 cracks in the walls of Pompeii, and observes 
 that some of them have been thrown out 
 
2 
 
18 VOLCANOES. 
 
 of the perpendicular, and have been repaired 
 and shoved up with props, he infers that the 
 fatal convulsion was not the first, and that 
 chese cities must have been shaken to their 
 foundation by the effects of previous earth- 
 quakes." 
 
 We may here remark that the first 
 earthquake of which we have any record, 
 was in the year A.D. 63. It occurred in 
 the vicinity of Vesuvius, and its conse- 
 quences were felfc chiefl}^ upon the cities 
 upon the Bay of Naples, amongst which 
 were Herculaneum and Pompeii. 
 
 Thucydides, who wrote more than 400 
 years B.C., makes a slight allusion to an earth- 
 quake which occurred at Euboea the Greek 
 Island, which is now called Negropont. 
 
 Teneriffe is the largest of the Canary 
 Islands. It is noted for a volcanic moun- 
 tain called the Peak, which is above 1200 
 feet high. Its highest crater, which is at 
 its summit, has not sent forth flames for a 
 very long time, but other craters on the 
 
PEAK OF TENERIFFt. 
 
20 VOLCANOES. 
 
 sides of it have been in a state of eruption 
 in recent times. 
 
 The Peak of TenerifFe was active in the 
 year 1 798, but it had then had no eruption 
 since 1706. The Peak of Teneriffe is 
 sometimes called the Peak of Teyde ; it is 
 a land-mark for ships in the North Atlantic 
 Ocean. 
 
 There are thirteen islands in the group 
 called the Canaries, and they are supposed 
 to be what the ancients called the Fortunate 
 Islands. The islands, of which the capital 
 is Santa Craz, in Tenerilfe, belong to the 
 Spaniards. They are all volcanic, and rise 
 abruptly from the ocean. Teneriffe is 
 about seventy miles long, and about twenty- 
 two miles broad. 
 
 The Volcano of Jorullo is in Mexico. 
 It is always burning. Its site, and the site 
 of all the volcanoes which surround it, was 
 part of the great plain of Malpais, until 
 the night of September 28, 1759. Then 
 more than three miles of level country was 
 
22 VOLCANOES. 
 
 upheaved into the shape of a cone, and a 
 number of mountains appeared, six of them 
 with an elevation of from 1312 to 1640 
 feet above the original level of the plain. 
 
 Around these mountains there are thou- 
 sands of small cones which are called 
 hornitos, or ovens," because they look 
 like ancient ovens, and they are as hot as 
 ovens. 
 
 The great volcano of Jorullo is about 
 1300 feet high. It is farther from the sea 
 than any other known volcano. 
 
 The Island of Volcano is one of the 
 Lipari Islands of which there are twelve, 
 all of volcanic origin. They were formerly 
 called the iEolian Islands," from ^olus, 
 the god of winds ; he, like Vulcan, was the 
 mythologic son of Jupiter. 
 
 Though the volcano in the Island ot 
 Volcano has not for ages emitted flames, it 
 emits gaseous vapours which prove that 
 the volcanic cause still exists in it. This 
 volcano is commonly called an extinct 
 
VO I CANOES. 23 
 
 volcano, that is a volcano in which 
 the fire has burnt out ; but a learned 
 traveller who examined it, says that it 
 greatly resembles an active volcano during 
 the cessation of eruption. He says that 
 
 KXTINCT VOLCANO. 
 
 he could not imagine a spectacle of more 
 solemn grandeur than that presented in its 
 interior, or conceive a spot better calculated 
 to excite in a superstitious age that religious 
 awe which caused the island to be considered 
 
24 VOLCANOES. 
 
 sacred to Vulcan, and the various caverns 
 below as the peculiar residence of the gods/' 
 
 Off the coast of Troas in Asia Minor, is 
 the Tsle of Lemmos, on which is an extinct 
 volcano. It is a famous island in heathen 
 mythology. Jupiter kicked his ugly de- 
 formed son Vulcan out of heaven into 
 Lemmos, and as heathen gods as well as 
 men had to do something for their living, 
 Vulcan's occupation was to forge thunder- 
 bolts for his father ! 
 
 Active volcanoes are usually divided 
 into two classes, the one aerial, having their 
 craters exposed to the air; the other sub- 
 aqueous, having their craters under water. 
 The crater ("cup"), is the mouth or 
 chimney of the volcano, whence the lava or 
 melted rock is ejected. 
 
 Aerial volcanoes are never far from the 
 sea. A line drawn round the Pacific Ocean, 
 so as to include the long range of moun- 
 tains on the west of America, the Asiatic 
 peninsula of Kamtschatka, and the Spice 
 
VOLCANOES, 25 
 
 Islands, will encompass the most extensive 
 volcanic system known. As we have re- 
 marked, there is but one active volcano on 
 the continent of Europe. There is not — so 
 far as is yet known — one volcano on the 
 continent of Africa, although nearly all its 
 
 VOLCANIC ISLAND. 
 
 groups of islands are either volcanic, or 
 have volcanoes. 
 
 It is likely that many aerial volcanoes 
 were once subaqueous; that the islands 
 themselves were the result of volcanic 
 action. In the present century, islands 
 
26 VOLCANOES. 
 
 have suddenly appeared, some have as sud- 
 denly disappeared. Most of them have 
 had craters. 
 
 HoTHAM Island was also called Graham 
 Island, and Corrao Island. It was thrown 
 up in the Mediterranean Sea, between the 
 south-west coast of Sicily and the coast of 
 Africa. This was in 1831. On the 10th 
 of July in that year, a Sicilian captain 
 named Corrao observed an immense column 
 of water rising from the sea. It was about 
 sixty feet high, and three hundred feet in 
 circumference. 
 
 Eight days afterwards he passed the 
 same spot again, and found that a small 
 island twelve feet high had been formed. 
 In the centre of it was a crater whence 
 immense columns of vapour and masses of 
 volcanic matter were ejected. 
 
 Gradually the island increased in height 
 and size up to the 4th of August, on which 
 day it was two hundred feet high, and three 
 miles in circumference. But from that day 
 
VOLCANOES. 27 
 
 it began to decrease. By the end of 
 October, the volcano and the island on 
 which it was, entirely disappeared ; one 
 
 IJOTHAM ISLAND, JULY 18, 1831. 
 
 small point above the surface of the water 
 marked the site which was regarded with 
 so much interest by scientific men three 
 months before. In the next year, an ex- 
 tensive shoal occupied the site of Hotham 
 Island, and in the year after that, a 
 dangerous reef nearly a mile in circumfer- 
 ence appeared. 
 
28 VOLCANOES. 
 
 Mount Hecla is a volcano in Iceland. It 
 is famous f(^r its many eruptions. Its height 
 is more than 5000 feet, and it is about 
 twelves miles in circumference. 
 
 There were no explosions from Hecla for 
 a period of between sixty and seventy 
 years previous to September 2, 1845, when 
 the eruptions were awfully grand. Volcanic 
 ashes from its summit fell on the largest of 
 the Orkney Islands, a distance of four hun- 
 dred miles. On the 15th of S^^ptember 
 the volcano resumed its activity, and its 
 lava was thrown out with such violence 
 that it fell in places from twenty to thirty 
 miles distant from the mountain. At a 
 distance of two miles from Hecla, tlie 
 stream of lava was a mile wide, and from 
 forty to fifty feet deep. Wherever the 
 lava flowed, the pasturage was destroyed, 
 so that in addition to the heavy losses 
 which the inhabitants sustained by large 
 numbers of their cattle perishing by the 
 burning lava, they had no means of pro- 
 
VOLCANOES. 29 
 
 curing fodder for the cattle that were 
 saved. 
 
 Hecla, though the best known of the 
 Icelandic volcanoes is not perhaps the most 
 
 MOUNT HECLA. 
 
 formidable. There are five others which 
 have had memorable eruptions, and it is not 
 known how many volcanoes there are in 
 Iceland. One of the most terrible eruptions 
 ever known in the island, or indeed in 
 Europe, was in the year 1783. This was 
 from the mountain called the Skaptar Jokul. 
 The lava flowed into the river Skapta and 
 
30 VOLCANOES. 
 
 dried it up, though in some places the bed 
 was nearly six hundred feet deep, and two 
 hundred feet broad. The lava not only 
 occupied all the river-way, but it also spread 
 over the fields on the banks of the river. 
 Onwards the stream of lava flowed till it 
 discharged itself into a great lake, the water 
 of which it licked up," or ''sent otf" in 
 steam. The lava overflowed from the bed 
 of the lake, and divided into two great 
 streams, one of which '' was precipitated 
 down a tremendous cataract called Stapa- 
 foss where it filled a profound abyss which 
 that great waterfall had been hollowing out 
 for ages, and after this the fiery current again 
 continued its course." About nine thousand 
 human lives were lost, and more than two 
 hundred thousand sheep and cattle, and 
 twenty-eight thousand horses perished. 
 
 The geysers or boiling springs of Iceland 
 owe the heatof their waters to volcanic action 
 Qeyser is an Icelandic word which means to 
 burst forth with great and sudden force. 
 
GEYSERS OF ICELAND. 
 
32 VOLCANOES. 
 
 Though the term volcano " is generally 
 applied to a mountain which ejects — or 
 which formerly ejected — lava, or melted 
 rocks ; it is sometimes used to denote a 
 mountain or elevation which ejects mud. 
 
 Such elevations are commonly called 
 " air volcanoes/' The most remarkable are 
 those of Turbaco, an American Indian 
 village in Columbia. The village is more 
 than eleven hundred feet above the level 
 of the sea. On a large desolate marshy 
 tract of land, in the midst of palm trees, 
 are a number of cones, varying in height 
 from nineteen to twenty-five feet; they 
 are air volcanoes. 
 
 The natives call them, Los Volcancitos, 
 the small volcanoes ; and they have a 
 tradition that the ground was formerly in 
 a state of ignition, in other words, that it 
 was a fire-volcano, but that a monk put 
 out the fire by throwing holy water on 
 it, and that the fire-volcano became a 
 water-volcano. 
 
3 
 
34 VOLCANOES. 
 
 Mud volcanoes are filled with water 
 through which air bubbles rise, and cause 
 about five explosions in two minutes. 
 
 Beneath the water there is soft mud to 
 a great depth. A stick has been pushed 
 into it to the depth of six or seven feet. 
 
 It is impossible to say how much the 
 surface of the globe has been from time 
 to time in far distant ages altered by 
 volcanic agency. One celebrated man con- 
 jectures that the islands which stretch from 
 Asia to Australia once formed part of a 
 great continent. All those islands have 
 volcanoes. One of the greatest volcanic 
 eruptions of modern times occurred on the 
 5th of April 1815. It was from Mount 
 Tomboro in the Island of Sumbawa. Its 
 influence was felt over the whole of the 
 Molucca Islands, over Java, a considerable 
 portion of the Celebes, Sumatra, and Borneo 
 to a circumference of 1000 statute miles 
 from its centre.'' Whole villages were 
 totally destroyed. Two places are mentioned 
 
VOLCANOES. 35 
 
 as containing certainly not fewer than 1200 
 persons at the time of the eruption, and of 
 that large number not more than six escaped I 
 
 There are basalt rocks in various parts of 
 the world, and they are all of volcanic origin. 
 Through some, water forces its way, and 
 murmurs in streams or roars in cascades. 
 
 Basalt rocks belong to that class of rocks 
 which geologists call Trappean, from a 
 Swedish word I'rappa, which signifies a 
 stair or step. The material is much the 
 same as that which forms greenstones, or 
 
 MUD VOLCANO. 
 
36 
 
 VOLCANOES. 
 
 what are commonly called whinstones, and 
 which sometimes assume the column or 
 prismatic form peculiar to basalt rocks. 
 There are many varieties of basaltic rock, 
 which we cannot describe in so small a 
 work as this, but we must not omit to 
 notice those of the form most attractive 
 and interesting, that is, the columnar and 
 angular form. They form as it were a link 
 between volcanoes and caves, for they are of 
 volcanic formation, and they present some 
 of the most interesting caves. Basalt 
 rocks are generally of great extent, and 
 their appearance is that of a number of 
 straight tall pillars placed closely together 
 to form a solid mass, each pillar has a 
 certain number of sides or angles. The 
 npmber varies from three to eight. A 
 mass of basalt rock presents more the appear- 
 ance of a work of art, than of what is too 
 commonly called a convulsion of nature." 
 It looks like the ruins of some magnificent 
 building. 
 
VOLCANOES. 37 
 
 The Giant's Causeway in county 
 Antrim, Ireland, is a great natural curi- 
 osity. It is an immense mass of basalt 
 rock, about 600 feet into the Atlantic 
 
 THE giant's causeway. 
 
 Ocean. Some of the masses of columns are 
 35 feet above the sea, though the greater 
 number are not more than 20 feet above 
 the water. 
 
 It is believed by some that the Giant's 
 Causeway and Fingal's Cave of which we 
 
38 
 
 VOLCANOES. 
 
 speak presently, are evidences that the 
 countries now called Scotland and Ireland 
 were — long before history was written, or 
 perhaps before the art of writing was in- 
 vented — part of a great continent. In 
 other words, that the country now called 
 Ireland was separated by volcanic agency 
 from that part of Great Britain which is 
 now called Scotland. That Britain itself 
 formed at one time part of the great con- 
 tinent of Europe is now almost generally 
 believed. How it was separated canr be 
 only conjectured. The probability is that 
 it was by volcanic agency which produces 
 earthquakes and other great convulsions of 
 nature. 
 
n._CAVi:RNS. 
 
 T is, by many learned men, believed 
 that volcanic mountains are the 
 huge domes of immense hollows 
 or caverns, in which the gaseous or 
 fiery vapours of the earth float. The 
 whole plain of Jorullo is supposed to be 
 the covering of an enormous cavern, or 
 
40 CAVERNS. 
 
 of an immense number of caverns which 
 communicate with each other; and, indeed, 
 the table-land of Quito, around which, as 
 we have already stated, are the greatest 
 and most powerful volcanoes, is supposed 
 to be but the covering of a vast vault. 
 
 Caverns are found in all parts of the 
 world ; in some rivers take their rise, in 
 others rivers are lost. In some the roar 
 of water may be heard beneath the 
 lowest floor, and it is probable that there 
 are subaqueous as well as subterranean 
 caverns. 
 
 One of the Hebrides or Western Islands 
 — a group of small islands which lie off the 
 west coast of Scotland, is called the Isle of 
 Staffa. It is celebrated for its basalt 
 caverns, the principal of which is called 
 Fingal's Cave. 
 
 Staff^i is a Norwegian word, which, like 
 the Anglo-Saxon word staef, signifies a 
 staff. The English town Stafford derives 
 its name from the fact that in ancient 
 
CAVERNS. 41 
 
 times, persons used to ford or go through 
 the river Sow on stilts by the aid of staves, 
 for there were no bridges in Britain. The 
 
 fingal's cave. 
 
 Scottish Island Staffa was so named because 
 the basalt columns of its caverns reminded 
 
42 CAVERNS 
 
 the Norwegians of immense staves or 
 poles. 
 
 The action of the waves has worn away 
 the basalt columns in various parts, and 
 thus the caverns have been formed. One 
 cave is called the Cormorant Cave, because 
 of the large number of Cormorants which 
 visit it. Another is called the Boat Cave. 
 But none of the caves are equal in size and 
 grandeur to Fingal's. It is more than 370 
 feet long, 53 feet wide at the mouth, at 
 which the height is about 118 feet. The 
 Gaelic name of the cavern signifies the Cave 
 of Music. It is so called from the echo of 
 the waves through its arches. 
 
 The Island of Antiparos is one of the 
 group of Greek Islands, called the Cyclades. 
 It has been long celebrated for its grotto, 
 the ceiling, walls, and floors of which have 
 beautiful stalactites and stalagmites in great 
 variety. 
 
 Stalactites are " droppings." Many 
 caverns are of limestone rock. From the 
 
CAVERNS. 43 
 
 roofs water drips slowly, and in very small 
 quantities. As it trickles from the surface of 
 the earth to the roof of the cavern, it mixes 
 
 GROTTO OF ANTIPAROS. 
 
 with carbonate of lime, which is held in 
 solution by carbonic acid. When the drops 
 of water come through to the roofs of the 
 caverns, the carbonic acid, being exposed to 
 the air, evaporates ; a little thin skin of lime 
 is left on the roofs of the caverns. As 
 
44 CAVERNS. 
 
 more water trickles through the thin skin 
 or pellicle of lime, as another coat, or skin, 
 or pellicle grows on it, then another, and 
 another, and so on till hundreds, thousands, 
 and in some cases millions of pellicles, one 
 upon another, depend or hang down from 
 the roofs like icicles. 
 
 Stalagmites are stalactites rising from 
 the ground or floor of caverns. When the 
 drops of water are large and heavy, they 
 fall to the ground, the carbonic acid evapo- 
 rates and leaves the carbonate of lime, and 
 so pellicle upon pellicle is deposited, until, 
 in the course of time, immense columns or 
 pillars are raised. 
 
 In many cases the stalactites and the 
 stalagmites meet and form pillars from the 
 ground to the roof. Such pillars look as 
 though they were built to support the 
 roofs. 
 
 The Peak Cavern in Derbyshire is 
 similar in form to that of Antiparos, that 
 is, it has a number of apartments as it were 
 
CAVERNS. 
 
 45 
 
 STALACTITK CAVKRN-. 
 
 resembling each other, and connected by 
 passages. The cavern is in Castleton Dale. 
 
46 CAVERNS. 
 
 It has an arched entrance 42 feet high, and 
 1 20 feet wide. There are houses, occupied 
 by twine makers, in the cave near its 
 entrance, but at a distance of about 100 
 feet, the roof of the cave becomes lower 
 and lower, till at last daylight entirely dis- 
 appears, and the visitor must proceed by 
 torchlight and in a stooping position till he 
 comes to a lake called the First Water. 
 The rock overhangs tlie water, and in one 
 place is less than two feet from its surface, 
 so that the visitor must lie down in the 
 boat in which he is ferried across the lake. 
 When the lake is crossed, a large cave is 
 reached. It is 220 feet long, 200 feet 
 wide, and in some parts 120 feet high, but 
 it is quite dark. 
 
 Beyond this great cavern, by the side of 
 what is called the Second Water, is another 
 cave formed by a projecting pile of rocks. 
 It is called Koger Eain s House," because 
 water is always dripping from the roof. 
 After that is another cavern called the 
 
CAVERNS. 47 
 
 Chancel, and after that there are several 
 others. The total length of the Peak 
 
 ENTRANCE TO TUE PEAK CAVERN. 
 
 Cavern is more than 2200 feet, and it is 
 more than 600 feet below the surface of 
 the mountain. 
 
 We have but briefly noticed a few of 
 many remarkable caverns which belong to 
 one kind as regards form or shape. There 
 are two other kinds. One in which the 
 caverns are immense cracks, or fissures, or 
 chasms in the rocks. They are seldom very 
 
48 CAVERNS. 
 
 wide, but often very long and very deep. 
 Eldon Hole inDerbj^shire is the most remark- 
 able cavern of this kind in Britain. Its 
 length and depth have not been ascertained. 
 
 The other kind of caverns is called trans- 
 parent, because the light of day can be seen 
 through them; they are open at both ends. 
 
 Caverns are frequently mentioned in 
 history — sacred as well as profane; they 
 have in all ages been used as places of 
 sepulture for the dead, and as places of 
 security or secresy for the living. In our 
 own times when science is making such 
 rapid strides, caverns are often museums to 
 the naturalist; he finds in them the bones 
 of interesting animals, and evidence that 
 animals now found only in distant countries 
 once inhabited places close to where there 
 are now largely populated British towns. 
 
siONsrii JO Aiisa3Aii«i 
 
 3Hi JO