THE SOUFRIERE VOLCANO.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIII, Issue 116, 17 May 1902, Page 5

THE SOUFRIERE VOLCANO.

The following description of a visit to the Soufriere volcano, on St. Vincent, by Dr. E. W. Alexander, is published in a Dunedin paper:—"St. Vincent is the most beautiful of the Windward Islands, the loveliness of the Mariaqua Valley being famed. I visited it twice, ascended the volcano, and made a circuit of the island, visiting several of the plantations. . I left Kingston one afternoon in a large canoe with topsides, probably a vestige of Carib architecture, in which we sailed and paddled along the leeward coast 22 miles to Soufriere, a small village under the mountain of the same name, which was originally called Morne Garou. A small canoe, paddled by one man, took me a little farther to Mr Cloak's estate, where the manager, to whom I had a letter, received me. The estate was one of a few which had remained some generations in the same family. I noticed in the garden next morning a flowering shrub with numerous small hum-ming-birds darting amonglthe flowers, looking like bright-coloured butterflies. The manager gave .me Mr Cloak's mule to take me as fax as there was a track, and a guide over the top of the volcano to the windward side of the island. The track was much like a watercourse, and steep, but passable. The way was entirely through forest until near the summit—lofty tree trunks, with leaves surrounding them, while the foliage quite shut out the sun. No bird life was visible, though the long, melancholy note of one bird was constantly heard. Grass and stunted bushes alone covered ttie mountain top. The crater was reached at about 3000 ft, a most striking one. It was quite perfect, a mile in diameter, with precipices and narrow terraces for 500 ft, clothed with trees, ferns, etc. At the bottom was a lake of a dark bottle-green colour, unruffled, and itself 500 ft to 600 ft deep. Coming as I did on to this vast and deep crater on the summit of a rounded mountain was most impressive, and the view of the crater was a fine one. But this crater was to all appearance extinct. No fire or eruption had marred its beauty and singularity for many centuries. Whence, then, came the enormous volume of ash which covered all the surrounding estates, and had even been wafted to Barbadoes? A little farther on was another vast cavity, but not*a. perfect one, separated from the original crater by the narrowest of ridges. This great opening belched forth all the ash of the eruption, and this crater was formed .then. It would probably be from it, too, that the present ash cloud came which was noticed over the mountain by the passing vessel. I had sent the mule back on getting out of the forest, the guide and I walking on up to the craters. The old crater is absolutely perfect, wooded and deep. At one time it was the source of lava floods, later of ash and mud eruptions. My guide, then a boy of nine or ten, remembered the eruption, and being taken a distance away to avoid the falling ash and the hot water streams. The volumes of water acting on the fallen ash swept it over valieys, filling them."