The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, September 26, 1897, Page 19

ry one has heard of the celebrated ion of Vesuvius which took place th r of our Li 79, aiter an U known number of centuries of inactivity at which time Pompeii, Herculaneum and | Stabig, cities of considerable size and importance nestling on the flanks of the mountain, were buried beneath a terrible shower of pumics-stone and volcanic dust. At the d n of the Christian efa | this region was densely populated. Num- erous towns and villages, in addition to the three cities zbove mentioned, either | occupied the lower <lopes of the moun- tain or lay at the very base. The thousands wh homes were upon | the slopes or 1n the vicinity of the base of | the mountain never dreamed of its char- | acter. Strabo, however, the celebrated Roman geographer, guessed at the truth. He intimates in his writings that he sus- pects that there lie hidden within the re- cesses of the smiling mountain forces i which might yet turn the fertile regirm" { into a desert. But the period thus pre dicted came sooner than the scientific | prophet himself expected. It came with bul few warnings and these were not un- derstood, and at its coming sudden de- struction fell, blotiing outin a few hours cities and towns and destroying thousands of human beings. Tne younger Pliny, in his letter tothe | historian Tacitus, gives a most graphic account of the scene, the smoke arising from the crater to an enormous height and spreading out in the upper atmos- | phere in the form of a colossal pine tree; the vivid display of lightnings and accom- panying peals of thunder minghng with noise of the eruption—the three days of | total darkness—the terrific explosions in ohe of which the very m tain was rent | | of 4000 tguare miles in twain and one of the parts thus formed blown to atoms: the awful fall of volcanic | materials, the accompanying tempests of wind an Up to 18 by common consent, the | eruption of Vesuvins just described was considered the greatest in the historic pe- riod, though one other held a place hardly inferior. Between America and Europe, on the very confines of the North Zone, lies that far-off strange island, born n Polar | of fire and water, known as Iceland, as | sad a misnomer by the way as Greenland In the southeastern portion of this b 5 | island lies a mountain platiorm, every- where over 4000 feet above the sea-level, upon which isa vast field of ice upward area. On southeastern margin of this glacial field | arise several mountain peaks to a height of over 6000 feet above the sea-level. The most famous of these is Skapter Jokuil. In 1783, when the population of the island had already exceeded 100,000, this volcano, heretofore inactive, suddenly in- dicated that it was not extinct, breaking out into one of the mostterrible eruptions of modern times. of lava was emitted, forming a vast stream, which soon separated into two, | one of which was over 100 feet deep and teen miles wide. These two rivers— ypes of Phiegethon and Acheron of the infernal regions—fowed on for over fifty miles until they reached the precipitous uffs marking the 1and terminus of the nd. Over these biuffs they poured— two awful, glowing lava cataracts, tartar- ean Niagaras, into the seething billows of the mighty deep. The resuld is far better imagined than de<cribed. From the di- rect effect of the eruption and indirectly from tbe destruction of the fish, thus cut- the | | on 8o smail a soale that he gathers a very An enormous amount | | rious rumblings, accompanied with slight SAN THE FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 26, 1897. 19 tiug off the chief food-supply of the peo- ple, over one-sixth of the inhabitants of | the island perished. | But these eruptions, great and awful as | ihey were, sink into insignificancy beforc that of Krakatoa. B:it understood, how- ever, that this statement is truer from the <tandpoint of the magnitule of the phe- nomenon itself than it is from that of its destructive effects upon human life, for happily the situation of the volcano was such that these effects were not extraordi- nary, though appalling enough. Let the reader now make an examina- tion of an atlas. [fhe atlas must be a good | one or he will search in vain for what he wants, while ofientimes even in a good one he will find the map he sought drawn inadequate conception of size and dis- tances. .Between the two vast islands Sumatra and Jave will be found the Straits of Sunda, within which once lay the island of Krakatoa—sometimes spelied Crokatoa. It was known to thie naviga- tors of the Eastern seas as a most charm- ing tropical 1sle. In the center arose an extinct volcanic peak. It was a favorite place for picnics and excursions. * Every town in the vicinity, even distant Batavia, the capital of Java, had its periodical picnic here. The profusion of tropical fruits which the isiand yielded, the mag- nificent prospect of land and water that lay beneath him who reached the moun- tain summit were attractions which pic- nickers could not resist. Early in January, 1883, the people who tived on the mainland on either side of the straits were treated to certain myste- tremors of the earth, us yet but mutter- ings of pent-up wrath within the depths of a mountain esteemed before so kind and friendly. The news of the unusual commotion spread, and Batavia and othér cities sent their thousands to the island, curions to see and hear. As the year advanced the mutterings increased in loudness, the ground shook more vio- lently, and finally about May the sounds resembled the steady roil of heavy and yet somewhat distant thunder. Then came the midwinter season in the Southern Hemisphere, the month of July, and with it a period of guiescence, ana the matter began to be forgotten. In August, however, the mutterings and rumblings recommenced with greater vigor than ever, with again some short periods of quiescence, The crisis was reached August 23 at 10 o’clock A. M. It was a beautiful Sabbath morning, and the waters of the Straits ot Sunda were like that sea of glass,as clear as crystal, of which John in his apocalyptic vision speaks. The beaunty of that morning was espectally enhanced by the extraordinary transparency of the tropical air, which brought the distant mountains most re- markably near—a phenomenon frequently observable before the advent of great dis- turbances of the earth’s interior. Now and then a mysterious rumbling wonld be heara—the only sound to disturb the breathless calm and silence that lay on nature. The eruptior about to take place was near—the mightiest, the most awful on record! The hour of 10 strikes and the eruption has begun. Almost instantly | sudden night snatches away heaven and day from the eyes of beholders, and, save for the vivid display of lightning around the colossal column of voleanic dust as- cending the skies, the darkness is total for STUPENDOUS TUMULT OF FTHE SEA ON THE DAY KRAKATOA 400 miles around, while within a circle whose radius is 1500 miles tbe obscurity is more or less profound. Within this latter area dust—often miscalled ashes, since there is properly speaking no burning of materials within a volcano—fell like snow from the skies, breaking off limbs of trees by its weight, even so far off as Batavia, 100 miles away. The explosions were so ioud as to be distinctly heard in Hindo- stan, 1800 miles away, and at Batavia the sound was like the constant roar of cannon to those present on the field of battle. The whole island, including the vol- cano—full forty square miles of surface— was blown to atoms, not a square {oot re- maining above the surface of the sea. Now followed one of the most awful con- tests of nature—a battle of death between Vulcan and Neptune. The sea poured down into the yawning abyss millions of tons of water, to be instantly converted into vapor by coming into contact with millions of tons of seeth.ng hot lava be- neath. The effect was terrible. Over the shores thirty milea away waves over 100 feet high rolled with such fury that everything to bedrock was swept away be- fore it. Blocks of stone of fifty tons weight were carried miles inland. On the Su- matra side ot the strait a large ship was lifted by the wave and stranded thres miles from the sea. The wave thus formed, growing less in intensity as it traveled, crossed the Indian Ocean 5000 miles to the Cape of Good Hope ana thence into the Atlantic, until finally it reached the eastern shores of America. At the beginning of the eruption vol- cano dust was carried upward to a height of twenty miles, whence it spread out into the whole atmosphere and the finest dust remained a year suspended in the upper regions of air before it began its descent. The reader may remember the peculiar red glow at sunrise and sunset in the latter part of 1883 and throughout the following year, for the existence of which at the time numerous theories were ad- vanced. The cause of these ruddy glows was the interference which the sun’s rays met in passing through an atmosphere having a great quanuity of impalpable dust in suspension. Now of all the rays of the solar spectrum the violet is most affected and the red least in passing through such an atmosphere, and such in- | terference will be specially noticeable when, because the sun is low, at or near the horizon, his rays must pass through a vast depth of air. Finally the impalpable dust referrea to in eradual descent reached the earth’s surface, some ot it mingling with the soil and some sinking to the clay ooze at the bottom of the ocean. Weil does Winchell speak of the strange fortune of these min- ute particles as follows: At first minute crystals they were vomited forth from the throat of the vol- cano into the air, where they imparted a ruddy glow to many a past sunset. Once the source of the roseate glory of the twi- light hour, they lie now in impenetrable darkness ana the repose of death. How changed the fortune of these microscopic fragments! They floated for months in the upper thin air—in the film of space which separates earth from heaven—borne hither by the simoon, thither by the anti- trades, hurled into the vortex of a cyclone and precipitated into the ocean by a fall- ing mass of vapor. Here seized by the waves and rocked and beaten at the sur- face till they reached a zone of calm, they SANK BENEATH THE WAVES began their descent into the dark worid, where they are cestined to rest undis- turbed for centuries.” The loss of life from this eruption was appalling. Thousands who on that calm and beautiful Sabbath morning arose with hearts of gratitude or of hate or of indifference to Him who has made the world perished pefore the day was done. Engulfed in the ocean or covered with heaps of ashes, a few hours only passed away and the awful work was accom- plished, and that vast multitude of hu- man beings vanished from off the face of the earth. Happily the neighborhood of the mountain was but sparsely inhabited, for such an eruption, should it ever occur in Vesuvius or in Atna, would depopu- late Southern Italy and the victims would be numbered by millions not thousands. Notwithstanding the awfulness of vol- canic phenomena there is a silver lining to the black clouds. They are demon- strative proof that the earthis yet a liv- ing planet. A dead planet it must eventu- ally become, but many sons must yet pass away ere it will reach the stage which the moon, with its smaller bulk and hence its quicker cooling, has already reached. OQur satellite is a prophecy in plain and unmistakable language of what our earth is to become when all its life forces—its internal energies—shall have been dissi- pated into space, and when its ocean and its atmosphere shall have been absorbed within its substance, to fill the cavities leit by the contraction of the present molten materials, which volcanic and earthquake phenomena demonstrate as still occupying in no considerable fzaction of its solid contents. ProFESsOR GRANVILLE F. FosTER. Crescent City, Cal., At the town of Caborca, in the Altardis- trict of Sonora, Mexico, construction bhas been commenced on what will be, when completed, the first and only one-rai tramway or railway in operation on tkh American continent. This novel railwa will run from San Salinas to Caborca, a | distance of twenty-five miles. The tramway is a nch invention, | | Cailiett the NE-TRACK RAILWAY NOW BEING jowned by the Monorail Portatif a Niveau du Sol, or Single-rail Por- table Tramway Company of Paris. | M. A. L. Caillett of Paris, who is one of the engincers of the company, is superintending the construetion of the railway at Caborca. According to M. sing vented only about five years ago. Vehicle Used in Moving Farm Products. s'ates that he never heard of it before then, or heard that anybody had tried it but the French company for which he is engineer. It is, M. Caillett says, very effective on long bauls through a mountainous coun- try where the grade is irregular. The car le-rail railway was in-|can be operated at a very small cost, es He | one mule or a donkey can haul a load weighing five tons, providing the road is fairly level. The track costs only $300 a mile, ties and all. A F ench mining company, ‘“Compania Mina San Salinas de Altar,” of which M. Leieune, a well-known Parisian, is mana- ger, is to operate the road that is at pre-- ent being constructed in Sonora. This company has some very rich goid and salt mines at San Salinas in the Altar district, while the offices and smelters of the com- pany are located at Caborea, a distance of twenty-five miles from the town of San Salinas. The monorail tramway will be used in conveying gold ore from the mines to the smelter, and in transporting passengers and provisions from Caborca to the LRI LR LR R R R AR R L R L R L L R R R R R R R R L AL LR T i / -“‘\‘j"i""'“‘” b 47 % Ly if 1 e L4 A W A k3 I‘H ‘fu;(.r(”‘("‘:."jl»' " [ o e i) hm(" Al e BUILT IN mines. The Jcar is to have a capacity of thirty tons per day according to the con- tract between the wmining and the tram- way companies. The contract calls for the use of only one car. By putting on more MEXICO are now filling in the Altar district. We have not placed one of our tramways in the United Staies, but before I leave for France I may try to introduce the mono- rail into some of the mining districts. It cars a capacity of 350 tons per day can be | isnot known in this country and the only reached. “We have,’” said M. Caillett, “another order in Mexico in addition to the one we | | notice it has ever received was a short one, which appeared not long since in a New York paper.” 2992999998928 9988 988898998