CHAPTER VIII

COSEGUINA AND OTHER VOLCANOES OF CENTRAL AMERICA

Central America has a great number of volcanoes extending along nearly all its western coast, or on the Pacific side of the country.

Central America consists of a high plain or table-land sloping gently towards the northeast, but terminating abruptly on the southwest. In the opinion of geologists this table-land consists of the surface of a huge tilted block of the earth's crust, or, perhaps, more probably, of a series of such blocks, that are limited on the southwest by a narrow belt of intersecting fractures. It is in these fractures that scores of volcanoes are situated, together with active craters, solfataras, and hot springs. The volcanoes are mainly of the Vesuvian type. There are so many volcanoes in this part of the world that it will be possible to describe but a few of them.

We will begin with the volcano of Coseguina, situated on the Pacific coast of Nicaragua. Its appearance is that of a conical mountain with the top cut off, and suggests that it is most probably an explosive volcano which has had the top blown away during some of its great eruptions.

Coseguina is celebrated by reason of its tremendous eruption of 1835. Before the still more tremendous explosive eruption of Krakatoa in 1883, described in the first two chapters of this book, Coseguina shared with Sombawa, on the island of Sumatra, as being the foremost of explosive volcanoes.

It had been estimated that before its eruption of 1835, Coseguina had a height of perhaps 10,000 feet, but so much of it was blown away by this eruption that it now is a little less than 4,000 feet.

The following description of the great eruption of Coseguina in 1835 has been condensed from an account prepared by Squier, published in 1850.

You will note in reading this brief account how closely many of the phenomena resemble those that occurred during the eruption of Krakatoa in 1833.

The eruption of Coseguina was heralded on the morning of January 20th, 1835, by several loud explosions that were heard for a distance of some 300 miles around the crater of the volcano. Then followed an ink black cloud formed directly over the mountain, which gradually spread on all sides shutting off the light of the sun, except for a sickly yellowish light. Fine sand was thrown from this cloud, which made it both difficult and painful to breathe. For two whole days the cloud continued to grow denser, the explosions louder and more frequent, and the rain of sand thicker. On the third day the explosions were strongest and the darkness greatest.

The amount of sand that fell from the cloud was so great that people left their houses, fearing the roofs would be crushed in by the great weight. This sand fell in large quantities over an area more than 1,500 miles in diameter, or, quoting the language of Squier:

"The noise of the explosions was heard nearly as far" (1,500 miles). "And the Superintendent of Belize, eight hundred miles distant, mustered his troops, under the impression that there was a naval action off the harbor. All nature seemed overawed; the birds deserted the air, and the wild beasts their fastnesses, crouching, terror-stricken and harmless, in the dwellings of men. The people for a hundred leagues grouped, dumb with terror, amidst the thick darkness, bearing crosses on their shoulders and stones on their heads in penitential abasement and dismay. Many believed that the day of doom had come, and crowded in the tottering churches, where, in the pauses of the explosions, the voices of the priests were heard in solemn invocation to Heaven. The brightest lights were invisible at the distance of a few feet; and to heighten the terror of the scene, occasional lightnings traversed the darkness, shedding a lurid glare over the earth. This continued for forty-three hours, and then gradually passed away."

It appears that the eruption of Coseguina was followed by violent earthquake shocks and other evidences of volcanic energy over extended regions. For example, there were fearful earthquakes along the Andes, the worst of which occurred on February 20th, and continued at the rate of three or four a day up to March 6th, and, less frequently, to March 17th. It was during one of these earthquakes that the city of Concepcion, Chile, was so completely destroyed, that but a single house remained.

The same brilliant sunsets and sunrises occurred in different parts of the world after the eruption of Coseguina, due to the presence of large quantities of volcanic dust that followed the great eruption of Krakatoa.

The cause of this great explosive eruption of Coseguina was most probably the same as that which is believed to have caused the eruption of Krakatoa, namely, a large volume of water suddenly gaining access to a mass of liquid lava.

Volcán del Fuego is another of the many volcanoes of Central America. It is situated as one of a group of volcanoes on the highest summit of the Isthmus. This volcanic mountain has a regular cone with regular slopes on all sides, except on the north, where a table-like projection, about 1,000 feet below the summit, is all that remains of a vast cone, the summit of which was blown away, according to Russell, in prehistoric times, just as was the crater of Somma on Vesuvius.

There have been in Central America, since the time of the Spanish conquest, some fifty volcanic eruptions sufficiently great to have been recorded. Some idea of the activity of Fuego during this time may be had from the fact that of all these eruptions some twenty were those of Fuego. At the present time, however, the volcano is dormant and apparently almost extinct.

The recorded eruptions of Fuego are nearly all of the explosive type. Among the most violent were those that occurred during 1526, 1541, and 1581. During 1582, 1585, and 1586, there were eruptions nearly every month, the most terrible being near Christmas day in 1586. Other memorable eruptions occurred in 1614, 1623, 1686, and 1705, and at other dates down to August 17th, 1860, from which date to the present time the volcano has been quiet.

We will conclude this brief description of the volcanoes of Central America with that of Volcán de Agua, or, as the word means, _The Water Volcano_. It is situated in Guatemala near the coast, and is one of the mountains that occupies the plateau on which Fuego is situated.

The Volcán de Agua is one of the most remarkable volcanoes in Central America, standing, as it does, nearly alone, and rising to an elevation of 3,350 metres (10,988 ft.), above the level of the sea. It has been extinct for a long time.

It has been supposed by some, from its name, that this is a volcano that throws out water. Others believe that the name comes from the water produced by the melting of the snow that is collected on the sides of the mountain. Now there almost always escapes from the craters of volcanoes during violent eruptions immense quantities of water vapor, which, condensing, fall as vast showers of rain that often deluge the surrounding country. In snow-clad mountains, the escape of lava is often attended by floods caused by the rapid melting of the snow. The water volcano did not, however, take its name from either of these facts, but rather because at the time of the Spanish invasion, the crater of the mountain was occupied by a large lake, and that during an earthquake in 1541 the wall of the crater was broken, when the lake was poured as an immense stream of water down the side of the mountain, overwhelming a village which was situated on this slope. That this was the correct origin of the same may be seen from the fact that the crater at the present time still shows the remains of its former lake basin, and that on the sides of the broken rim an immense ravine can be seen through which the water poured down on the village below.

Daubeny describes this volcano as follows:

"The Volcán de Agua (Water-Volcano) is of enormous height, being covered with eternal snow, in the latitude of 14°. Captain Basil Hall estimates it at more than 14,000 feet, but a recent traveller states it at 12,600. It has the form of a blunted cone clothed with perpetual verdure to its summit. The crater is from forty to sixty yards in depth, and about 150 in diameter,--the sides and bottom strewed with masses of rock, apparently showing the effects of boiling water or of fire.

"By a deluge of water from this volcano in 1527, the original city of Guatemala was overwhelmed; and the next built, called the Old City, _La Antiqua_, was ruined by an earthquake in 1773. The present capital is situated at a distance of eight leagues from the mountain."

Another volcano in this part of the country is described by Daubeny as follows:

"Massaya, near the lake of that name, was one of the most active vents at the time of the first discovery of the country. Its flames were visible twenty-five miles off. Its crater was only twenty or thirty paces in diameter; but the melted lava 'seethed and rolled in waves as high as towers.' A story is told of a Dominican who imagined the fluid lava was melted gold, and descended into the crater with an iron ladle to carry some away; but the ladle, it is said, melted, and the monk escaped with difficulty."