Stromboli: Stones Like Artillery Fire

Transcript

In Jane Loudon’s 1848 account of the natural world, Stromboli is a volcano she describes as continually burning. She says its explosions are frequent, sometimes following one another rapidly. Each sends up a shower of red-hot stones, a sight she compares to a bombardment of artillery. The image gives the scene its force: repeated bursts, and stones flung upward like a barrage. Loudon presents this description directly; in this passage, she does not credit a traveler or earlier authority. Her account leaves us with a striking picture of Stromboli’s continual activity, conveyed through the movement of those red-hot stones.