Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 49, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 December 1895 — Walking Over Hot Lava. [ARTICLE]

Walking Over Hot Lava.

During the eruption of Mount Vesivius iu July last the stream of molten lava flowing down the flank of the volcano, on the side toward Naples, buried a large section of the carriage road by which tourists ascend the mountain. About two months later a correspondent of The Youth’s Companion visited Naples and climbed Vesuvius. At the point where the lava bad cut across the road the mountain guides bad constructed a foot path over the crust which had already formed ou the surface of the stream of molten rock. The experience of crossing was a most intern* ing one. The cooled lava, broken into masses of all sizes, and presenting grotesquely contorted forms, cracked and slipped under the feet, and its Sharp points aud edges cut the shoes as a heap of broken knife-blades might have done. ' Occasionally a blast of heat, rising from under bis feet, reminded the traveler of what was beneath him, while here and there large, ragged holes vomited steam and sulphurous vapors into his face. In several places, one of which was but a few feet from the path, the molten lava was still gushing from rents u the crust. It flowed downward with a creeping motion, its surface being curiously roughened by seams running crosswise in such a manner as to give the red-hot mass something the appearance of a gigantic burning worm, several rods in length and twenty or thirty feet broad, issuing out of the black side of the mountain, and slowly twisting its way along with successive contractions and expansions of its glowing segments. The surface was already hardening while it flowed, and a stone thrown upon it, although making a dent, rebounded and skipped along without sinking into the fiery paste.- One could stand within a yard of the edge and thrust the point of a cane or umbrella into the moving lava. The heat that struck the hands and face was no.t greater than that encountered at the open door of a furnace or close to a grate of burning coal.