cities, and crossing the Bay of Naples, seek for a new illustration in the formation of Monte Nuovo, a lofty hill overlooking the ancient town of Pozzuoli. About one o’clock at night, on Sunday, the twenty-ninth of September, 1538, flames were seen to issue from the ground close to the waters of the beautiful bay of Baiae. After a little, a sound like thunder was heard, the earth was rent asunder, and through the rent large stones, red-hot cinders, volcanic mud and volumes of water, were furiously vomited forth, which covered the whole country around, reaching even as far as Naples, and disfiguring its palaces and public buildings. The next morning it was found that a new mountain had been formed by the accumulation of ejected matter around the central opening. This mountain remains to the present day, and is called the Monte Nuovo. In form it is a regular volcanic cone, four hundred and forty feet high, and a mile and a half in circumference at its base, with an open crater in the centre, which descends nearly to the level of the sea. An eye-witness who has left us a minute account of this eruption, relates that on the third day he went up with many people to the top of the new hill, and looking down into the crater, saw the stones that had fallen to the bottom, “boiling up just as a caldron of water boils on the fire.” The same writer informs us--and it is very much to our present purpose to note the fact--that immediately before the eruption began, the relative position of land and sea was materially changed, the coast was sensibly upraised, the waters retired about two hundred paces, and multitudes of fish were raised high and dry upon the sand, a prey to the inhabitants of Pozzuoli.[92]