During its progress over this gentle slope, it acquired the usual crust
of hardened slag. It directed its course towards that point at which Val
del Bove opens into the narrow ravine beneath it--there being between
the two a deep and almost perpendicular precipice. Arrived at this
point, the lava-torrent leaped over the precipice in a vast cascade, and
with a thundering noise, arising chiefly from the crashing and breaking
up of the solid crust, which was in a great measure pounded to atoms by
the fall; it throwing up such vast clouds of dust as to awaken an alarm
that a fresh eruption had begun at this place, which is within the
wooded region.
A very violent eruption, which lasted more than nine months, commenced
on the 21st of August, 1852. It was first witnessed by a party of
English tourists, who were ascending the mountain from Nicolosi in order
to see the sunrise from the summit. As they approached the Casa Inglesi
the crater commenced to give forth ashes and flames of fire. In a narrow
defile they were met by a violent hurricane, which overthrew both the
mules and their riders, and urged them toward the precipices of the Val
del Bove. They sheltered themselves beneath some masses of lava, when
suddenly an earthquake shook the mountain, and their mules in terror
fled away. As day approached they returned on foot to Nicolosi,
fortunately without having sustained injury. In the course of the night
many bocche del fuoco (small lava vents) opened in that part of the Val
del Bove called the Bazo di Trifoglietto, a great fissure opened at the
base of the Giannicola Grande, and a crater was thrown up from which for
seventeen days showers of sand and scoriae were ejected.
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