seen from the beautiful Bay of
Baiae, it often contrasts so strongly in verdure with Monte Nuovo, which
is always clothed with arbutus, myrtle, and other wild evergreens, that
a stranger might well imagine the cone of older date to be that thrown
up in the sixteenth century.[516]

There is nothing, indeed, so calculated to instruct the geologist as the
striking manner in which the recent volcanic hills of Ischia, and that
now under consideration, blend with the surrounding landscape. Nothing
seems wanting or redundant; every part of the picture is in such perfect
harmony with the rest, that the whole has the appearance of having been
called into existence by a single effort of creative power. Yet what
other result could we have anticipated if nature has ever been governed
by the same laws? Each new mountain thrown up--each new tract of land
raised or depressed by earthquakes--should be in perfect accordance with
those previously formed, if the entire configuration of the surface has
been due to a long series of similar disturbances. Were it true that the
greater part of the dry land originated simultaneously in its present
state, at some era of paroxysmal convulsion, and that additions were
afterwards made slowly and successively during a period of comparative
repose; then, indeed, there might be reason to expect a strong line of
demarcation between the signs of the ancient and modern changes. But the
very continuity of the plan, and the perfect identity of the causes, are
to many a source of deception; since by producing a unity of effect,
they lead them to exaggerate the energy of the agents which operated in
the earlier ages. In the absence of all historical information, they are
as unable to separate the dates of the origin of different portions of
our continents, as the stranger is to determine, by their physical
features alone, the distinct ages of Monte Nuovo, Monte Barbara,
Astroni, and the Solfatara.

The vast scale and violence of the volcanic operations in Campania, in
the olden time, has been a theme of declamation, and has been contrasted
with the comparative state of quiescence of this delightful region in
the modern era. Instead of inferring, from analogy, that the ancient
Vesuvius was always at rest when the craters of the Phlegraean Fields
were burning--that each cone rose in succession,--and that many years,
and often centuries, of repose intervened between different
eruptions,--geologists seem to ha