The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1881-10-12
Chimboraae and Cotopaxi.

Mr.. Edward Whymper, the Alpine
climber, recently described to London
audience his ascents of the Andean
peaks of Chimborazo and Cetopaxi
He and his party reached the summit of
Chimborazo on the Sd of January of
last year, after most arduous climb.
They found the wind blowing at the
rate of fifty miles an hour, from the
northeast, and driving the snow before
it. With extreme difficulty a reading
of the mercurial barometer was effected.
The mercury fell to AL inches with
temperature Of twenty-one degrees
Fahrenheit This being worked out, in
comparison with nearly simultaneous
observation at Guayaquil, gave 20
feet for the height of Chimborazo. They
began the descent at twenty minutes
past five, with scarcely an hour and
quarter of daylight and reached their
camp (about IL, 400 feet above the sea-
leveD about nine p. M, having been out
nearly sixteen hours, and on foot the
whole time.
Passing from an extinct to an active
volcano, Mr.. Whymper next gave an
account of his journey to the crater of
Cotopaxi. Observing with the tele-
scope, during an enforced stay at
Machachi, that much less smoke or
vapor was given off at night than by
day, he resolved, if possible, to pass
night on the summit. On the 18th Of
February the party got to the edge of
the crater, having passed almost the
whole way from their camp at height
of 15, 900 feet to the foot of the final
cone over snow and then over ashes
mixed with ice. The final cone was
the steepest part of the ascent and on
their side presented an angle of thirty
six degrees. When they reached the
crater vast quantities of smoke and
vapor were boiling up, and they could
only see portions of the opposite
side at intervals, and the bottom
not at all. Their tent was pitched $50
feet from the edge of the crater, and
during violent squal the india-rubber
floor of the tent was found to be on the
point of melting, maximum thermome-
tershowing temperature of ITO degrees
on one side of the tent and of but fifty
degrees on the other; in the middle it
was 72.5 degrees. Outside it was in
tensely cold, and thermometer on the
tent cord showed minimum of thirteen
degrees. At night they had a fine view
of the crater, which has a diameter
from north to south of 1000 feet, and
from east to west of about 1,5O0 feet.
In the interior the walls descend to the
bottom in series of steps of precipice,
and slope good thousand feet, and at
the bottom there was nearly circular
spot of glowing fire, 200 feet in diam
eter. On the sides of the interior higher
up, assures, from which Pickering
flames were leaping, showed that the
lava was red hot very short distance
below the surface. The height he found
to be $500 feet. The party remained
at the top for twenty-six consecutive
hours, sleeping about $50 feet below
the loftiest point
Nearly five months later, Mr.. Whym-
per returned to Chimborazo, and from
. second reading of the barometer at
Ia, ,02S inches, with temperature of
fifteen Fahrenheit, he made the height
20, 489 feet, the mean of the two read
ings giving 20.517 feet. While on the
side of Chimborazo he witnessed mag
nificent eruption of Cotopaxi, ashes
rising in column 10000 feet above the
rim of the crater and then spreading
over an area of many miles. Professor
Bonney had submitted the ashes to mi
croscopic examination and found that the
fineness varied from 1000 to 25, 900 par
ticles to the grain in weight, and from
observation of the area over which the
ashes fell, Mr.. Whymper calculated that
at least two million tons must have
been elected in this eruption.