ave to deal, such the ruthless powers
of nature that spread around us and lurk beneath us, such the terrific
forces which only bide their time to break forth and sweep too-confident
man from the earth's smiling face.

THE SUBTERRANEAN POWERS

The subterranean powers here spoken of, those we had denominated earth's
demons of destruction, are the volcano and the earthquake, the great
moulding forces of the earth, tearing down to rebuild, rending to
reconstitute, and in this elemental work often bringing ruin to man's
boasted fanes and palaces.

No one who has ever seen a volcano or "burning mountain" casting forth
steam, huge red-hot stones, smoke, cinders and lava, can possibly forget
the grandeur of the spectacle. At night it is doubly terrible, when
the darkness shows the red-hot lava rolling in glowing streams down
the mountain's side. At times, indeed, the volcano is quiet, and only
a little smoke curls from its top. Even this may cease, and the once
burning summit may be covered over with trees and grass, like any other
hill. But deep down in the earth the gases and pent-up steam, are ever
preparing to force their way upward through the mountain, and to carry
with them dissolved rocks, and the stones which block their passage.
Sometimes, while all is calm and beautiful on the mountains, suddenly
deep-sounding noises are heard, the ground shakes, and a vast torrent
tears its way through the bowels of the volcano, and is flung hundreds
of feet high in the air, and, falling again to the earth, destroys every
living thing for miles around.

It is the same with the earthquake as with the volcano. The surface of
the earth is never quite still. Tremors are constantly passing onward
which can be distinguished by delicate instruments, but only rarely are
these of sufficient force to become noticeable, except by instrumental
means. At intervals, however, the power beneath the surface raises
the ground in long, billow-like motions, before which, when of violent
character, no edifice or human habitation can for a moment stand. The
earth is frequently rent asunder, great fissures and cavities being
formed. The course of rivers is changed and the waters are swallowed up
by fissures rent in the surface, while ruin impends in a thousand
forms. The cities become death pits and the cultivated fields are buried
beneath floods of liquid mud. Fortunately these convulsions, alike of
the earthquake and volcano, are comparative rar