Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 4.djvu/260

2 character among our nobility," who had made attempts to give much trouble to prudent people, by his conduct at Naples. But the kingdom of the two Sicilies was but the shadow of a European power, and was only regarded as it followed one or other of the great nations whose contests shook the world. It afforded in its active existence no arena for the statesman or the soldier. It was in the dust of buried ages that was hid beneath its soil that the active mind found employment in that feeble kingdom, and these were the only objects worthy to absorb the attention of the distinguished person whom we are commemorating.

On his arrival at the interesting country of his mission, Mr Hamilton repeatedly visited Vesuvius and Etna, and from a minute examination of the whole surrounding country, collected numerous important geological observations, which were from time to time, between the years 1766 and 1779, transmitted to the Royal Society, and afterwards made their appearance in the transactions of that body, and in the Annual Register. It was the design of Sir William Hamilton, to point out in these observations such evidence as might lead geologists to a better comprehension of the influence of subterraneous fires on the structure of the earth, and to display the first links of a chain of reasoning, which it was his hope future industry might make complete. It was his opinion that the land for many miles round Naples, was not, as it was generally supposed, a district of fruitful land, subject to the ravages of flame; but a part of the surface of the globe which owed its very existence to the internal conflagrations by which it was shaken. In illustration of this he considered Etna to have been formed by a series of eruptions, at protracted periods, as the smaller eminence of Monte Nuovo, near Puzzuoli, had been formed by one eruption of 48 hours' continuance. Among other minute circumstances, he discovered that the streets of Pompeii were paved with the lava of a former age, and that there was a deep stratum of lava and burnt matter under the foundations of the town, showirg that the earliest eruption of history was not the first of nature, and that the labours of man might have been more than once buried beneath such coverings. As illustrations of these valuable remarks, the author collected a magnificent assortment of the various descriptions of lava, which he lodged in our national museum, that naturalists might be able to trace a connexion betwixt these immediate productions of the volcano, and other portions of the crust of the globe. These remarks were afterwards digested and systematized, and produced, first " Observations on mount Vesuvius, mount Etna, and other volcanoes of the two Sicilies," published in London in 1772. The next, a more aspiring work, was published at Naples in 1776, in two folio volumes, and called "Campi Phlegraei, Observations on the Volcanoes of the two Sicilies, as they have been communicated to the Royal Society of London, by Sir William Hamilton." The numerous plates in this magnificent work of art, from views taken on the spot by Mr Valris, a British artist, are faintly engraved in little more than outline, and coloured with so much depth and truth, that they assume the appearance of original water-colour drawings of a very superior order. They are illustrative of his favourite theory, and represent those geological aspects of the country which he considered peculiarly applicable as illustrations. It is to be remarked, that neither in his communications to the Royal Society, nor in his larger works, does this author trace any complete exclusive system. He merely points out the facts on which others may work, acknowledging that he is disposed to pay more respect to the share which fire has had in the formation of the crust of the earth, than Buffon and others are disposed to admit. "By the help of drawings," he says, "in this new edition of my communications to the society, which so clearly point out the volcanic origin of this country, it is to be hoped that farther discoveries of the same nature may be made, and