Part 49
There are in Java thirty-eight large mountains, which, although they differ from each other in external figure, agree in the general attribute of volcanoes, by their having a broad base, which gradually verges toward the summit, in the form of a cone. One of these is named Tankuban-Prahu, on account of its resembling, at a distance, a boat turned upside down: it forms a vast truncated cone. Its base extends to a considerable distance, and it is not only one of the largest mountains in the island, but a most interesting volcano. Although it has not for many ages had any violent eruption, as is evident from the progress of vegetation, and from the depth of black mold which covers its sides, its interior has continued in a state of uninterrupted activity. Its crater is large, and has, in general, the shape of a funnel, but with its sides very irregular: the brim, or margin, which bounds it at the top, has also different degrees of elevation, rising and descending along the whole course of its circumference. This may be estimated at a mile and a half; and the perpendicular depth on the south side, where it is very steep, is at least two hundred and fifty feet: toward the west it rises considerably higher. The bottom of the crater has a diameter of nine hundred feet, but is not regular in its form, which depends on the meeting of the sides below.
Near the center it contains an irregular oval lake, or collection of water, the greatest diameter of which is nearly three hundred feet. The water being white, it exhibits the appearance of a lake of milk, boiling with a perpetual discharge of large bubbles, occasioned by the development of fixed air. Toward its eastern extremity are the remaining outlets of the subterraneous fires, consisting of several apertures, from which an uninterrupted discharge of sulphurous vapors takes place. These vapors rush out with an incredible force, with violent subterraneous noises, resembling the boiling of an immense caldron in the bowels of the mountain. When at the bottom, the force of the impression made on the spectator by this grand and terrific scene, is increased by the recollection of the dangers he had to encounter in the descent; while the extent of the crater, and the remains of the former explosions, afford an indescribable enjoyment, and fill his mind with the most awful satisfaction.
The explosions of mud, called by the natives _bledeg_, are, as we have already seen, a great curiosity. This volcanic phenomenon is in the center of a limestone district, and is first discovered, on approaching it from a distance, by a large volume of smoke, which rises and disappears at intervals of a few seconds, and resembles the vapors arising from a violent surf. A dull noise, like that of thunder, is at the same time heard; and on a nearer approach, when the vision is no longer impeded by the smoke, a large hemispherical mass is observed, consisting of black earth, mixed with water, about sixteen feet in diameter, rising up to the hight of twenty or thirty feet in a perfectly regular manner, and, as it were, pushed up by a force beneath. This mass suddenly explodes with a dull noise, and scatters, in every direction, a volume of black mud. After an interval of a few seconds, the hemispherical body of earth or mud again rises and explodes. In the same manner this volcanic ebullition goes on without interruption, throwing up a globular body of mud, and dispersing it with violence through the neighboring plain. The spot where the ebullition occurs is nearly circular, and perfectly level, and is entirely covered with the earthy
## particles, impregnated with salt water, which are thrown up from below.
The circumference may be estimated at about half a mile. In order to conduct the salt water to the circumference, small passages, or gutters, are made in the loose muddy earth, which lead it to the borders, where it is collected in holes, or salt wells, dug in the ground, for the purpose of evaporation. The mud recently thrown up, possesses a degree of heat greater than that of the surrounding atmosphere, and emits a strong, pungent and sulphurous smell. This volcanic phenomenon is situated near the center of the large plain which interrupts the series of the more considerable volcanoes, and owes its origin to the general cause of the numerous volcanic eruptions which occur in the island of Java.
The tremendous violence with which nature marks the operations of volcanoes in these regions, will be best exemplified by the following details of the extraordinary and wide-spreading phenomena which accompanied the eruption of the Tomboro mountain, in the island of Sumbawa, one of the Javanese cluster. This eruption, which happened in April, 1815, was sensibly felt over the whole of the Molucca islands, over Java, and over a considerable portion of Celebes, Sumatra and Borneo, to a circumference of a thousand statute miles from its center, by _tremulous motions_ and _loud explosions_; while, within the range of its more immediate activity, embracing a space of three hundred miles around it, it produced the most astonishing effects and excited the most alarming apprehensions. On Java, at the distance of three hundred miles, it seemed to be awfully present. The sky was overcast at noonday with a cloud of ashes; the sun was enveloped in an atmosphere, the palpable density of which it was unable to penetrate; showers of ashes covered the houses, the streets and the fields, to the depth of several inches; and, amid this darkness, explosions were heard at intervals, like the report of artillery, or the noise of distant thunder. Every one conceived, that the effects experienced might be caused by eruptions of some of the numerous volcanoes on the island; but no one could have conjectured, that the shower of ashes which darkened the air, and covered the ground of the eastern district of Java, could have proceeded from a mountain in Sumbawa, at the distance of several hundred miles.
The first explosions were heard at Java, on the evening of the fifth of April, and continued until the following day, when the sun became obscured, and appeared to be enveloped in a fog. The weather was sultry; the atmosphere close; and the pressure of the latter, added to the general stillness, seemed to forebode an earthquake. This lasted for several days, the explosions continuing, but not with so much violence as at first. On the evening of the tenth, the eruptions, however, were more loud and more frequent; ashes fell in abundance; the sun was nearly obscured; and in several parts of the island a _tremulous motion of the earth_ was felt. On the following day, the explosions were so tremendous as to shake the houses perceptibly in the more eastern districts.
In the island of Sumbawa itself, there was a great loss of lives, and the surviving inhabitants were reduced to extreme misery. It appears from the account of the rajah, who was a spectator of the eruption, that on the evening of the tenth of April, three distinct columns of flame, all apparently within the verge of the crater of the Tomboro mountain, burst forth, and, after ascending separately to a very great hight, united their tops in the air. The whole of the mountain now appeared like a body of liquid fire, extending itself in every direction. Stones and ashes were precipitated; and a whirlwind ensued, which blew down the greater part of the houses in an adjoining village. It tore up by the roots the largest trees, and carried them into the air, together with men, horses, cattle, and whatever came within its influence. The sea rose nearly twelve feet higher than usual, a phenomenon commonly attendant on earthquakes, overwhelming the plantations of rice, and sweeping away houses, with whatever came within its reach. It is calculated that full twelve thousand individuals perished. The trees and herbage of every description, along the whole of the north and west sides of the peninsula, were completely destroyed, with the exception of a high point of land near the spot where the village of Tomboro stood.
The extreme misery to which the inhabitants of the western part of the island were reduced, was dreadful to behold. The roads were strewed with dead bodies; the villages were almost entirely deserted, and the houses fallen down. The peasants wandered in all directions in search of food; and the famine became so severe, that one of the daughters of the rajah died of hunger. To judge of the violence of the eruption, it will suffice to state, that the cloud of ashes which had been carried with so much celerity as to produce utter darkness, extended, in the direction of the island of Celebes, two hundred and seventeen nautical miles from the seat of the volcano; and, in a direct line toward Java, upward of three hundred geographical miles.
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BASALTIC AND ROCKY WONDERS.
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THE GIANT’S CAUSEWAY.
This vast collection of basaltic pillars is in the vicinity of Ballimony, in the county of Antrim, Ireland. The principal, or grand causeway, (there being several less considerable and scattered fragments of a similar nature,) consists of an irregular arrangement of many hundred thousands of columns, formed of a black rock, nearly as hard as marble. The greater part of them are of a pentagonal figure, but so closely and compactly situated on their sides, though perfectly distinct from top to bottom, that scarcely anything can be introduced between them. These columns are of an unequal hight and breadth: several of the most elevated, visible above the surface of the strand, and at the foot of the impending angular precipice, are of the hight of about twenty feet, which they do not exceed, at least not any of the principal arrangement. How deeply they are fixed in the strand, has never yet been ascertained.
This grand arrangement extends nearly two hundred yards, as it is visible at low water; but how far beyond is uncertain: from its declining appearance, however, at low water, it is probable that it does not reach beneath the water as far as it is seen above. The breadth of the principal causeway, which runs out in one continued range of columns, is in general from twenty to thirty feet: in some parts it may, for a short distance, be nearly forty. From this account are excluded the broken and scattered pieces of the same kind of construction, which are detached from the sides of the grand causeway, as they do not appear to have ever been contiguous to the principal arrangement, although they have been frequently comprehended in the width, which has led to such wild and dissimilar representations of this causeway, in the different accounts that have been given. Its highest part is the narrowest, at the very spot of the impending cliff, whence the whole projects; and there, for about the same space in length, its width is not more than from twelve to fifteen feet. The columns of this narrow part incline from a perpendicular a little to the westward, and form a slope on their tops, by the unequal hight of their sides; and in this way a gradual ascent is made at the foot of the cliff, from the head of one column to the next above, to the top of the great causeway, which, at the distance of about eighteen feet from the cliff, obtains a perpendicular position, and lowering from its general hight, widens to between twenty and thirty feet, being for nearly three hundred feet always above the water. The tops of the columns being, throughout this length, nearly of an equal hight, form a grand and singular parade, which may be walked on, somewhat inclining to the water’s edge. But from the high-water mark, as it is perpetually washed by the beating surges at every return of the tide, the platform lowers considerably, becoming more and more uneven, so as not to be walked on but with the greatest care. At the distance of a hundred and fifty yards from the cliffs, it turns a little to the east for the space of twenty or thirty yards, and then sinks into the sea. The figure of these columns is, with few exceptions, pentagonal, or composed of five sides; and the spectator must look very narrowly indeed to find any of a different construction, having three, four or six sides. What is very extraordinary, and particularly curious is, that there are not two columns in ten thousand to be found, which either have their sides equal among themselves, or display a like figure.
The composition of these columns or pillars, is also deserving the attention of the curious observer. They are not of one solid stone in an upright position, but composed of several short lengths, nicely joined, not with flat surfaces, but articulated into each other like a ball and socket, or like the joints in the vertebræ of some of the larger kinds of fish, the one at the joint having a cavity, into which the convex end of the opposite is exactly fitted. This is not visible unless on disjointing the two stones. The depth of the concavity or convexity is generally about three or four inches. It is still further remarkable, that the convexity and correspondent concavity of the joint, are not conformable to the external angular figure of the column, but exactly round, and as large as the size or diameter of the column will admit; consequently, as the angles of these columns are in general very unequal, the circular edges of the joints are seldom coincident with more than two or three sides of the pentagonal, and are, from the edge of the circular part of the joint to the exterior sides and angles, quite plain. It ought likewise to be noticed as a singular curiosity, that the articulations of these joints are frequently inverted, in some of them the concavity being upward, in others the reverse. This occasions that variety and mixture of concavities and convexities on the tops of the columns, which is observable throughout the platform of this causeway, without any discoverable design or regularity with respect to the number of either.
The length of these particular stones, from joint to joint, is various: they are in general from eighteen inches to two feet long; and for the greater part, longer toward the bottom of the columns than nearer the top, the articulation of the joints being there somewhat deeper. The size, or diameter, likewise of the columns, is as different as their length and figure: in general they are from fifteen to twenty inches in diameter. Throughout the whole of this combination there are no traces of uniformity or design, except in the form of the joint, which is invariably by an articulation of the convex into the concave of the piece next above or below it: nor are there traces of a finishing in any part, whether in the hight, length or breadth. If there be particular instances in which the columns above water have a smooth top, others near them, of an equal hight, are more or less convex or concave, which shows them to have been joined to pieces that have been washed away, or by other means taken off. It can not be doubted but that those parts which are constantly above water have gradually become more and more even, at the same time that the remaining surfaces of the joints must necessarily have been worn smoother, by the constant action of the air, and by the friction in walking over them, than where the sea, at every tide, beats on the causeway, continually removing some of the upper stones, and exposing fresh joints. As all the exterior columns, which have two or three sides exposed to view, preserve their diameters from top to bottom, it may be inferred, that such is also the case with the interior columns, the tops of which alone are visible.
Notwithstanding the general dissimilitude of the columns, relatively to their figure and diameter, they are so arranged and combined at all the points, that a knife can scarcely be introduced between them, either at the sides or angles. It is most interesting to examine the close contexture and nice insertion of the infinite variety of forms exhibited on the surface of this grand parade. From the great dissimilarity of the figures of the columns, the spectator would be led to believe the causeway a work of human art, were it not, on the other hand, inconceivable that the genius or invention of man should construct and combine such an infinite number of columns, which should have a general apparent likeness, and still be so universally dissimilar in their figure, as that on the minutest examination, not two in ten or twenty thousand should be found having their angles and sides equal among themselves, or those of one column to those of another. As there is an infinite variety in the configuration of the several parts, so there are no traces of regularity or design in the outlines of this curious phenomenon: including the broken or detached pieces of a similar structure, they are extremely scattered and confused. Whatever may have been their original state, they do not at present appear to have any connection with the grand or principal causeway, as to any supposable design or use in its first construction; and as little design can be inferred from the figure or position of the several constituent parts.
This singular formation is not confined to the Giant’s Causeway; but to quite a distance from it, the cliffs exhibit, in many parts, similar columns. At the depth of ten or twelve feet from the summit of the cape of Bengore, the rock begins to assume a columnar tendency, and forms a range of massy pillars of basalt, which stand perpendicular to the horizon, presenting in the sharp face of the promontory, the appearance of a magnificent gallery or colonnade, upward of sixty feet in hight. This colonnade is supported on a solid base of coarse, black, irregular rock, nearly sixty feet thick, abounding in what are called blebs, (that is, little blisters as it were on the rock,) and also in air holes; but, though comparatively irregular, it evidently affects a peculiar figure, tending in many places to run into regular forms, resembling the shooting of salts and many other substances during a hasty crystallization. Beneath this great bed of stone, stands a second range of pillars from forty to fifty feet high, more exactly defined, and emulating in the neatness of its columns, those of the Giant’s Causeway. This lower range is upborne by a layer of red ocher stone, which serves as a relief to show it to greater advantage. The two admirable natural galleries, with the interjacent masses of irregular rock, form a perpendicular hight of one hundred and seventy feet, from the base of which the promontory, covered with rock and grass, slopes down to the sea a considerable space, so as to give an additional hight of two hundred feet, making in all nearly four hundred feet of perpendicular elevation, and presenting a mass, which for beauty and variety of coloring, for elegance and novelty of arrangement, and for the extraordinary magnitude of its objects, can not, perhaps, be rivaled by anything at present known.
The promontory of Fairhead raises its lofty summit more than four hundred feet above the level of the sea, and forms the eastern termination of Ballycastle bay. It presents a vast compact mass of rude columnar stones, the forms of which are extremely gross, many being a hundred and fifty feet in length. At the base of these gigantic columns lies a wild waste of natural ruins of an enormous size, which, in the course of successive ages, have been tumbled down from their foundations by storms, or some more powerful operations of nature. These massive bodies have occasionally withstood the shock of their fall, and often lie in groups, and clumps of pillars, resembling artificial ruins, and forming a very novel and striking landscape.
Many of these pillars lie to the east, in the very bottom of the bay, at the distance of about one-third of a mile from the causeway. There the earth has evidently fallen away from them upon the strand, and exhibits a very curious arrangement of pentagonal columns, in a perpendicular position, apparently supporting a cliff of different strata of earth, clay, rock, &c., to the hight of a hundred and fifty feet. Some of these columns are from thirty to forty feet high, from the top of the sloping bank beneath them; and being longer in the middle of the arrangement, shortening on either of the sides, have obtained the appellation of _organs_, from a rude likeness in this particular to the exterior or frontal tubes of that instrument. As there are few broken pieces on the strand, near this assemblage of columns, it is probable that the outside range, as it now appears, is in reality the original exterior line toward the sea; but how far these columns extend internally into the bowels of the incumbent cliff is unknown. The very substance, indeed, of that part of the cliff which projects to a point, between the two bays on the east and west of the causeway, seems composed of similar materials; for, besides the many pieces which are seen on the sides of the cliff, as it winds to the bottom of the bays, particularly on the eastern side, there is at the very point of the cliff, and just above the narrow and highest part of the causeway, a long collection of them, the heads or summits of which just appearing without the sloping bank, make it evident that they lie in a sleeping position, and about half-way between the perpendicular and horizontal. The heads of these columns are likewise of mixed surfaces, convex and concave; and they evidently appear to have been removed from their original upright position, to the inclining or oblique one they have now assumed, by the sinking or falling of the cliff.
BASALTIC COLUMNS.
In the country surrounding Padua, in Italy, there are several basaltic columns, similar to those of the Giant’s Causeway, although less magnificent in appearance. About seven miles in a southern direction from that city, is a hill named Monte Rosso, or the Red mount, which presents a natural range of prismatic columns, of different shapes and sizes, placed in a direction nearly perpendicular to the horizon, and parallel to each other, nearly resembling that part of the Giant’s Causeway, called the organs.