In form it is of marvellous grace and beauty, forming a
perfect cone, about fifty miles in circuit at base and rising to a
height of 8,900 feet. It is one of the most prominent landmarks to
navigators in the island. From its crater streams upward a constant
smoke, accompanied at times by flame, while from its depths issue
subterranean sounds, often heard at a distance of many leagues. The
whole surrounding country is marked by evidences of old eruptions.
This mountain, in 1767, sent up a cone of flame of forty feet in
diameter at base, for ten days, and for two months a wide stream of lava
poured from its crater. A month later there gushed forth great floods of
water, which filled the rivers to overflow, doing widespread damage
to the neighboring plantations. But its greatest and most destructive
eruption took place in 1812, the year of the great eruption of the St.
Vincent volcano. On this fatal occasion several towns were destroyed and
no less than 12,000 people lost their lives. The debris flung forth
from the crater were so abundant that deposits deep enough to bury the
tallest trees were formed near the mountain. In 1867 another disastrous
explosion took place, and still another in 1888. A disaster different
in kind and cause occurred in 1876, when a terrible tropical storm burst
upon the mountain. The floods of rain swept from its sides the loose
volcanic material, and brought destruction to the neighboring country,
more than six thousand houses being ruined by the rushing flood.
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