ABSTRACT
B U F F O N Q U E S T I O N E D the above Sandy or gritty Ashes fell down as a rain & were composed, as I observed through a Microscope, of small pieces of pumice Stone; of shining, irregular-shaped pieces of a black glassy Slag, which looked brownish & semitransparent when the light was reflected on them by the Mirror of the Microscope, of white transparent irregular-shaped pieces of Glass or Quartz; of fibrous shining, acerose particles like Asbest & of some black irregular opaque black particles; in short as particles of a substance which had undergone a violent change in the Fire. These Ashes lay on all the plants & Vegetables of the Isle, & one day our Ship was covered by them, when the Wind was standing from the Volcano; & the whole Surface of the Isle consists of these Ashes.1 When Mr de Buffon in his Theory of the Earth2 speaks of the Volcanos, he says, they are in the high mountains. This Expression is for a philosopher too vague, too indeterminate. Which mountains does he call high ones? Those that are capt by Clouds, or such as are below that mark? and if below the heighth of the clouds, (which by the bye is likewise an indeterminate heighth) which heighth is convenient for Volcanos; or does he understand by high mountains, such as have none higher near them; if this is to be understood, there is an instance to the contrary to be met with in this Volcano of Tanna because the ridge of Mountains to the South of the Volcano is certainly more than twice the heighth of the Volcano, if not 3 times. If he means 150 yards to be a high hill, I allow our Volcano is on a high hill: but I believe, there are but few, who would take the word high hill in that Sense: & the Volcano or Volcanos in the Isle of Ambrrym were by no means on high hills,3 nor on the
1 The ash is carried NW on the back of the SE trade wind as much as 10 miles away.
