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Show Gigantic SPHINX in circling waves admire, And M -EMNON bending o'er his broken lyre; 0' er furrow' d glebes and green favannas f weep, And towns and tetnples laugh a1nid the deep. V. 1. "High in the frozen North where HECCLA glows, And melts in torrents his coeval fnows ; I 46 O'er iDes and oceans ilieds a fanguine light, Or lhoots red fl:ars atnid the ebon night ; When, at his bafe into1nb' d, with bellowing found Fell Gr ESAR roar' d, and ftruggling fhook the ground; r so Ftll ciifar roar' d. 1. 15o. The boiling column of water at ,Giefar in Iceland was nineteen feet in diameter, and fometimes rofe to the height of ninety-two feet . On cooling it dcpofited a filiceous matter or chalcedony forming a bafon round its bafe. The heat of this water before it rofe out of the earth could not be afcertained, as water loofes all its heat above 212 (as foon as it is at liberty to expand) by the exhalation of a part, but the flinty bafon which is depofited from it !hews that water with great degrees of heat will diffolve filiceous matter. Van Troil's Letters on Iceland . Since the above account in the year 1780 this part o( Iceland has been defl:royed by an earthquake or covered with lava, which was probably effected by the force of aqueous fl:eam, a greater quantity of water falling on the fubterraneous fires than could efcape by the antient outlets and generating an increafed quantity of vapour. For the difperfion of contagious vapours from volcanos lee an account of the Harmattan in the notes on Chunda, Vol. II. ( I 29 J Pour' d from red nofl:rils, with her fcalding breath,. A boiling deluge o'er the blafl:ed heath; And, wide in air, in mifl:y volumes hurl' d Contagious atoms o'er the alarmed world · ' NYMPHs! YOUR bold myriads broke the infernal fpe11, 155 And cruili' d the Sorcerefs in her flinty celL 2. " Where with foft £res in unextinguilh'd urns,, Cauldron' d in rock, innocuous La;a burns ; On the bright lake YOUR gelid hands diftil In pearly {howers the parfimonious rill ; And, as aloft the curling vapours rife 'Through the cleft roof, ambitious for the fkies, In vaulted hills condenfe the tepid fl:eams, And pour to HEALTH the medicated firearns. 160 -So in green vales arnid her mountains bleak I 6 5 Bu X TONIA fmiles, the Goddefs-N ytnph of Peak; Buxtoniajmiles. 1. 166. Someargumentsarementionedinthenoteon Fucus, Vol. If. to lhew that the warm fp rings of this country do not arife from the decompofition of pyrites near the furfa cc of the earth, but that they are producer! uy fleam rifing up the PArnl. S |
