The Minneapolis journal., 1902-08-16


But there have been. understand. two
more eruptions of Pelee, one of which, on
July 8, was specially formidable.
Il, said ashes. Everybody there and
elsewhere at the time said that ashes
were thrown out. But there were no
ashes were merely the upper surface of
the magma wrested off in the form of
dust when the first great explosion took
place far within the earth as the magma
and the water met. 1t was not ashes.
1T was rock dust
1T looked exactly like Portland ce-
ment. This difference could be- noticed,
on feeling the ashes between ones fingers,
that the volcanic substance developed
small, gritty PARTICLES, while Portland ce-
1hent would have remained smooth.
Imagine 500 tons, or 100000 pounds Of
Portland cement mixed with water and
smeared like thick, yellow varnish over
each square mile Of the silent, motion
less, lifeless ruins Of Minneapolis, and
you can form some idea of the appear
ance Of st. Pierre when I reached there
the hrst white man on the scene.
There was no lava either. Lava is
merely magma out. side It's shell, the
opened oyster of the earth. Within some
volcanoes, in those of the Mediterran-
can region the magma rises not merely
high enough to meet with water but high
enough to overflow the crater and pour
down the mountain sides. This extruded
substance, changed somewhat. perhaps
after contact with water, is lava or super
terraneous magma. But the magma never
rises to the top Of Pelee or to the top Of
Soufriere in St. Vincent. No lava was
seen last spring. I inquired diligently
| and learned that no real lava had ever
been erupted by any volcano in the West
Indies
"1he so-called lava was simply mud
the mixture OF the magma dust, or ashes,
with the condensed steam from the VOL
cano. The streams of lava were streams
| OF this mud that sealed the secret of St.
Pierre. ,E":.t
''The rock dust rose into the air at a
distance of ten miles or more and was
waited by the wind upwards of hun
dred miles on some days before it began
falling. But in addition to the dust and
the mud and the gas, great boulders, some
OF them eighteen feet in diameter, were
thrown up many miles towards the sky
they went UP vertically, however, and fell
back upon the sides of the mountain
doing practically no harm at any time.
The smaller stones that fell further away
were little, light fragments of a pumice-
like nature, mere scoriae.
Explosion Downward.
1.-THE outburst that destroyed st. Pierre
came not from the crater from an ancient
assure on the side of the mountains
assure that had been closed for centur-
les. I believe that there was a sort of
chamber within the mountain opposite
the assure and that when the gas burst
through 1t shot, not upward but down
ward, and along the angle of the noun
| tainside.
This led the survivors to say that "a
cloud of fire. fell on them.
Il don't think 1t was fire. 1t was some
CT {c hot
Some explosive gases are filled with oxy-
| gen, some are utterly devoid of oxygen.
| This seems to have been gas without
| oxygen. 1t was a gas eager, even rabid
to absorb oxygen. 1t took the oxygen at
once from every substance that it encount-
cred and chemically dissolved them. That
was what happened, no doubt to some
5000 people who were on the side of ST.
Pierre nearest t % the mountain. Their
hodiess have never been discovered. The
ravenous gas rushed upon them, wrenehed
forth the oxygen from their bodies and
dissolved them in the twinkling of an eye
! One minute after this shark of hell sprang
at them 5000 men and women had van
| ished into nothing.
1.-The gas also extracted the oxygen
| from many substances other than human
| flesh. This accounts for the annihilation,
| the dissolving, of many portions of the
| ruined town. Some districts are as fiat
! as if the site had originally been a deso-
late plain. !
A Mighty Whfrlwind.
''The gas probably caught fire from
electric discharges or from hearths,
furnaces, etc., in the city. The dis
charged mass was said to be on fire. But
1t seems rather to have burst out into a
series of explosions. The gas revolved
like mighty wheel as it advanced, con-
staDtly expanding. and increasing it's di-
ameter.
1.-The rate of its progress varied from
| $50 to 210 miles an hour. A man stand
Ing at safe spot on the Morne Rouge
back of the city drew out his watch as
he saw the first explosion. He watched
the advancing, rolling wave of fire and
| dust and timed it. Why said he to me-
1T moved quite slowly. 1t took fully two
| minutes to go clear across the city But
| that distance, I soon learned, was from
| five to seven miles. So the slow speed
noted was about 200 miles an hour
Nevertheless, if there were no earth
quakes accompanying this eruption, and if
| the real cause of volcanic disturbances
| seems as mysterious now as ever, the
| scientists did observe one very remark
| able phenomenon that may afford event.
ually a key to explanations. This was
| the violent electrical disturbance that
| began about the time of the first eruption
ana LnaC' prevailed through the ent1re
| period of the volcanic activity. The elec-
trical excitement could not be definitely
| located. 1t was reflect ed by apparatus in
various portions of the earth. The whole
globe seemed to be suffering from a shock.
| It appeared that the electrical distress
! became more acute at the very time of
| the several eruptions.
ttOf course, these observations are not
| all the knowledge we need. Perhaps the
electric excitement was the cause of the
eruptions and possibly it was the result
| of them. Maybe, the two phenomena were
| simply coincident But electricity was
MINCED with the torrent that swept away
St. Pierre. In the ruins were found iron
vessels perforated after a fashion that
displayed the characteristic signs of the
passage of an electric bolt.
| Eyes, perhaps that same invisible giant
| who gently rings our doorbell rang last
May the death knell of 100000 people.
C00D0I \ DFWFT