The most interesting of the group is Java, which is almost entirely of volcanic origin, and contains no less than thirty-eight mountains of that conical form which indicates their having at one time or other been active volcanoes. Only a few of them, however, have been in activity in more recent times. The most remarkable eruption was that of the mountain named Papandayang, which occurred in 1772. During this convulsion the greater part of the mountain, which was formerly one of the largest in the island, was completely swallowed up in some great underground gulf. On the night between the 11th and 12th of August of that year, the mountain appeared to be wholly enveloped in a remarkable luminous cloud. The inhabitants fled in consternation; but before they could all escape, the mountain began to totter, and the greater part of it tumbled down and disappeared. The crash with which it fell was dreadful, the noise resembling the discharge of volleys of artillery. Besides that part of the mountain which thus fell in, a large extent of ground in its neighbourhood was ingulfed. The space measured fifteen miles in length and six in breadth. The ground for many miles round this space was covered with immense quantities of ashes, stones, cinders, and other substances thrown out by the volcano. These were, on many parts of the surface, accumulated to the height of three feet; and even at the end of six weeks, the layers thus deposited retained so much heat as to render the mountain inaccessible. By this dreadful occurrence forty villages were destroyed, some ingulfed with the ground on which they stood, others buried under the loose materials which had been ejected. Not far short of three thousand of the inhabitants perished. Another of the volcanoes of Java, called Galoen-gong, burst into eruption in 1822, commencing with a terrible explosion of stones, ashes, &c., followed by a stream of hot mud, which overspread a large tract of ground. This eruption proved still more fatal to human life, about four thousand persons having been destroyed. So lately as September 1849, Mount Merapia, another volcano in this island, which had been supposed to be quite extinct, burst forth into an eruption, which lasted three days. It was accompanied by a violent hurricane. The bed of a river was filled up by the matter thrown out from the crater, and the destruction of property in crops, &c., was immense. Fortunately the inhabitants succeeded in making their escape, so that no lives were lost. A second eruption of this mountain however, in January 1864, was more disastrous, three hundred and fifty people having perished.