ETNA IN ERUPTION.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1233, 15 September 1911, Page 5

ETNA IN ERUPTION.

sixteen craters active. PEASANTS FLEE IN PANIC. By Telegraph-Press Association-Copyright Rome, Septembor 13. Tho eruption of Etna is a grander spectacle than that of 1010. Sisteen 1 cratcrs are belching out fire and smoke, and two of the lower craters are vomiting lava, which is travelling at the rate of four, hundred yards hourly, ravaging vineyards and destroying tages.The pino forests are burning fiercely. There arc incessant earthquakes, accompanied by noises like bombs exploding. The inhabitants of t'lie country are panic-stricken and aro seeking safety' on tho plains. THE TERROR OF SICILY. ETNA'S EIGHTY ERUPTIONS. Perhaps no mountain in tlio world has provoked tho wonder, tho .admiration, the dread, and tho superstitious awe that Ltna has. In an article in tho "Nineteenth Century" last year the Hon. A. X. Hood recalled some of tho more notable of tho eighty odd outbreaks that havo been recorded.

In 390 B.C. a torrent of lava ran down the eastern side a distance of twenty-four miles to the sea, which it entered with .a breadth of two miles, forcing Hamilcar the Carthaginian, on his way to Syracuse from Messina, to march his troops round by the back of the mountain. In 126 B.C. Etua poured forth streams of lava, and "tlio sea by Lipara boiled furiously, several ships being burnt by subterranean fires, and a quantity of dead fish were cast upon the shore, which being devoured bv the inhabitants caused a fatal cpidcmic. 1 ' Four years after Catania was grievously menaced, and would have been entirely destroyed had not tho lava, when almost within tho city walls, turned at right angles and flowed into the sea. The Emperor of Caligula was frightened from Messina by an outbreak; and another eruption occurred in the second year after tho capluro of Jerusalem by Titus. In tho reign of the Kmperor Dccnis (A.D. 251), Etna broke out again with loud bellowings, vomiting a forrent of lava which menaced Catania once more. Charlemagne seems to hnvo been vastly alarmed by an eruption in 812. One of the most disastrous convulsions ill history occurred during tho rrjgn of William the, Good, in 1169. Yet another eruption is recorded in 132!), when with a crash like thunder the lava burst forth, while red-hot rocks were hurled into tlie sea. New craters opened, vomiting lava and other burning matter. A terrible outbreak occurred in 10G0, when a flow of lava, after overwhelming fourteen towns and villages, turned towards Catania, and reaching Albanelli, hardly two miles from the city, it lifted up anil transported to n considerable distance an argillaceous hill covered with cornfields, then an eutiro vineyard, which floated for some time on its burning bosom. At length it reached the walls of the city. Meeting this obstacle tho lava flood accumulated till it rose to the ton of tho rampart, which was CO feet in height, and then tumbled over in a eascado of fire, overwhelming pa-rt of the city with the ruins of tho ancient Naumachia and Circus.