EXPLOSION OF GUNPOWDER.

415

almost disappeared in sober manhood; but I can go nofurther on volcanoes, before giving preliminary observa-tions on the nature of all things—the great to wav.

I believe I am not quite right in my chronology, for it wasprevious to this period that I witnessed a most dreadfulcalamity through the ignition of seven great cart loads ofgunpowder, in the suburbs between Resina and La Terredel Greco. At four o’clock, one fine summer’s morning,l was awakened by the shaking of my bed and of the house,as by the shock of an earthquake, to which I, in fact,attributed the effect. I ran to the top of the house andlooking towards Vesuvius , saw a vast column of blacksmoke ascending from the Resina-road. At first I thoughtthat an eruption had broken out at the foot of themountain, but appearances corrected that idea. Im-mediately I awoke my groom and, mounting my horse,gallopped to the spot, which by the road is seven miles—asthe crow flies, about four. A dismal sight was presentedto my view. The fragments of seven carts strewed about,together with the bodies of the oxen singed as black ascoal, some of them still breathing, mutilated with brokenhorns and limbs. At least a dozen houses were throwndown on each side of the road, and the sleeping inhabitantsburied under the ruins. The drivers and the escort of thecarts were no where to be seen,—they were blown awaypiece-meal. A singular instance of the power of gunpowderwas shewn by its action on an open iron railing and loftyiron gates before a gentleman’s garden. The bars,although presenting so small a surface to the action of theblast, were bent and wrenched from out the copingstone, and many of them broken in twain. I put my horseup at an inn, and taking off my coat assisted in diggingout the sufferers amongst the ruins ; twenty-six were founddead, and about sixty others were more or less injured,