Page:Awful phenomena of nature (2).pdf/37

 and parading in the ſtreets, added to the horror As the lava did not appear to have yet a ſufficient vent, and it was now evident that the earthquakes already felt had been occaſioned by the air and fiery matter confined within the bowels of the mountain, and probably at no ſmall depth (conſidering the extent of thoſe earthquakes) Sir William recommended so the company that was with him. who began to be much alarmed, rather to go and view the mountain at ſome greater diſtance, and in the open air, than to remain in the houſe, which was on the ſea ſide, and in the part of Naples that is neareſt and moſt expoſed to Veſuvius. They accordingly proceeded to Poſilipo, and viewed the conflagration, now become ſtill more conſiderable, from the ſea ſide under that mountain; but whether from the eruption having increaſed, or from the loud reports of the volcanic exploſions being repeated by the mountain behind them, the noiſe was much louder, and more alarming than that they had heard in their firſt poſition, at leaſt a mile nearer to Veſuvius After ſome time, and which was about two o'clock in the morning of the 16th, having observed that the lavas ran in abundance, freely, and with great velocity, having made a conſiderable progreſs toward Reſina, the town which it firſt threatened, and that the fiery vapours which had been confined had now free vent through many parts of a crack of more than a mile and a half in length, as was evident fro a the quantity of inflamed matter and black ſmoke, which continued to iſſue from the new mouths above mentioned, without any interruption, our author concluded that at Naples all danger from earthquakes, which had been his greateſt apprehenſion, was totally removed, and he returned to his former ſtation at St. Lucia at Naples.