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As the captain spoke, a tremendous outburst on Krakatoa turned their minds to other subjects. They were by that time drawing near to the island, and the thunders of the eruption seemed to shake not only the heavens but even the great ocean itself.
Verbeek, in his treatise on this subject, estimates that a cubic mile of Krakatoa was propelled in the form of the finest dust into the higher regions of the atmosphere probably about thirty miles!
They were presently swept away to destruction in an invasion of the shore by the tremendous waves with which the seas surrounding Krakatoa were agitated. "As the days of August passed by the spasms of Krakatoa waxed more and more vehement. By the middle of that month the panic was widespread, for the supreme catastrophe was at hand.
"You're workin' yourself into them up-in-the-clouds, reef-point-patterin' regions again which, by the way, should be pretty well choked wi' Krakatoa dust by this time. Come down out o' that if ye want to hold or'nary intercourse wi' your old father. She's far too young yet, my boy. You must just do as many a young fellow has done before you, attend to your dooties and forget her."
When a pebble is tossed into a pond a beautiful series of concentric ripples diverge from it; so when Krakatoa burst up in that mighty catastrophe, a series of gigantic waves were propagated through the air; they embraced the whole globe, converged to the antipodes of Krakatoa, thence again diverged, and returned to the seat of the volcano; a second time the mighty series of atmospheric ripples spread to the antipodes, and a second time returned.
They passed Krakatoa, and gazed with interest and amazement at the evidences of the awful havoc and ruin that had been wrought by the terrific eruption of '83; and emerged into open water again in time to witness a magnificent sunset behind the mountain of Radja Bassa, on the island of Sumatra.
All along the coasts of the adjoining large islands towns and villages were swept away and their inhabitants drowned, till the total loss was, as nearly as could be estimated, 36,000 souls. Krakatoa thus surpassed Mont Pelee in its tale of destruction.
There are, however, a number of volcanoes in the world which in certain features surpass Ætna as much as that crater does Vesuvius. Of these we shall consider but two Skaptar Jokul, of Iceland, remarkable for the volume of its lava flow, and Krakatoa, an island volcano between Java and Sumatra, which was the seat of the greatest explosion of which we have any record.
It will be remembered that while the hermit's cave was on the southern side of Krakatoa, facing Java, the stair and passage leading to the observatory completely penetrated the peak of Rakata, so that when standing on the ledge they faced northward and were thus in full view of all the craters between them and Perboewatan.
I say, Massa Nadgel, seems to me dat dere's not much left ob Krakatoa." They had approached near enough to the island by that time to perceive that wonderful changes had indeed taken place, and Van der Kemp, who had been for some time silently absorbed in contemplation, at last turned to his daughter and said
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