Jenks's Portland Gazette

ACCOUNT OF AN ISLAND

Lately found near the Santorina, an island in the Archipelago.

At the entrance into the crescent of the Santorina, or between the promontories of the island, which makes its two horns, there are four lesser islands: the largest, however, is not inconsiderable. Tradition says, that all these have been thrown up by volcanoes and eruptions from the bottom of the sea, and there is reason to believe it. What was called the New Island, was produced in that manner, in a place before absolute and unfathomable sea but a little while ago; and there is no cause to doubt the authority of the accounts which give the same origin to others.

The people of Santorini were all terrified by this unaccustomed roarings under ground, and even under the bed of the sea, though so deep as to have no known bottom. They were collected to the shore by the noise, and watched night and day with the alarm, conscious some thing terrible must be the event. At length the fire threw itself up from the surface of the sea at a distance; and when the daylight and the dispersion of the smoke gave them opportunity of seeing, there was a high rock of solid matter raised above the surface of the water; the roaring below continued; the fire tossed itself up from the middle of the new raised island, and every shake more and more matter was raised, the bulk increased, and the island grew under the eyes of the spectators more and more considerable.

The violence of the subterranean perturbation began after some days to abate: the fire was less and less strong: at length it was seen only in the night, and soon after not at all. The new island was at first a mass of pumice, and of slags of melted and mixed minerals; by degrees its surface has become less rugged. The sea has washed its shores to the common appearance of the other islands; the sun has calcined the rough tops of the stones, the rains have washed them down: the slime of the sea has blended with the powder of these burnt rocks, and the island is covered in most parts with a coat of vegetable mould, and produces plants and animals. We saw worms and snails, and a number of their lesser species. Would it not puzzle a naturalist to say how they came here. Be it as it will, they increase, and by their decay produce new matter for their succession. The plants rot, and the very bodies of the dead animals add to and invigorate the soil.