Mont Pelee and the Tragedy of Martinique; A Study of the Great Catastrophes of 1902, with Observations and Experiences in the Field (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1903 Excerpt: ...with the' highest point lying in the northwest. It is plain to see in this direction that it is only part of a former larger mountain, whose buttressed masses lie still farther to the north, and of which the Morne Siberie and the Piton Pierreux, the latter nearly two thousand feet in elevation, are still prominent relics. The sea face is on this side abrupt and precipitous, presenting ragged bluffs and promontories, with some detached islands and island points. Standing off some little distance from this side of the coast, the spectator obtains the only symmetrically contoured outline of the volcano, and notes the majestic extent of its great flanks as they sweep over the whole forefoot of the island. The gently falling slopes to the interior, being usually free of complication and rising with low gradients of from fifteen to twenty-five degrees, are exceedingly pleasing to the eye, and conform to the picture of many of the other volcanic mountains of the Lesser Antilles. Towards the southeast, Pelee sends out a long ridge to unite with the mass of the Pitons de Carbet, the point of second elevation in the land (three thousand nine hundred and sixty feet); and thus builds out, with the peaks of Carbet and their long slopes, nearly the whole mountain relief of two-thirds of the island of Martinique. The volcano itself covers a surface area of about fifty square miles. The singular manner in which the mountain has been cut up into ridge-backs and deeply separating water-ways, all radiating from almost the exact centre of the volcano, may liken it to a many-rayed elevated star. Some of these ridge-backs are sharp enough to permit them to be called aretes, and they fall off rapidly into the troughs that lie on either side. Streams of variou...