Page:Burning mountains.pdf/24

(24) waſhed off the volcanic matter, it ſcarcely weig three.

In the town of Somma, our author found churches and about ſeventy houſes without roofs, full of aſhes. The great damage on that ſide of mountain, by the fall of the aſhes and the torre happened on the 18th, 19th, and 20th of J and on the 12th of July. The 19th, the aſhes ſo thick at Somma, that unleſs a perſon kept in tion, he was ſoon fixed to the ground by th This fall of aſhes was accompanied alſo with  reports, and frequent flaſhes of the volcanic ning, ſo that, ſurrounded by ſo many horrors, it  impoſſible for the inhabitants to remain in the to and they all fled; the darkneſs was ſuch, althoug was mid-day, that even with the help of torch was ſcarcely poſſible to keep in the high road. the 16th of July, ſignor Guiſeppe Succo went u the crater, and, according to his account, which been printed at Naples, the craters of an irreg oval form, and as he ſuppoſes (not having been  to meaſure it) of about a mile and a half in circference; the inſide, as uſual, in the ſhape of a verted cone, the inner walls of which on the ea ſide are perpendicular; but on the weſtern ſide  the crater, which is much lower, the deſent was ticable, and So with ſome of his companions tually went down one hundred and ſeventy-ſix pa from which ſpot, having lowered a cord with a tied to it, they found the whole depth of the  to be about five hundred palms. But ſuch obſtions on the crater of Veſuvius are of little cquence, as both its form and apparent depth ſubject to great alterations from day to day.