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It was a heavy gas, like firedamp, and it must have asphyxiated the inhabitants before they were touched by the fire, which quickly followed. As we drew out to sea in the small steamship, Mont Pelee was in the throes of a terrible convulsion. New craters seemed to be opening all about the summit and lava was flowing in broad streams in every direction.
This theory is sustained by the experience of the survivors who were taken from the ships in the harbor, as they say that their first experience was one of faintness. The dumb animals were wiser than man, and early took warning of the storm of fire which Mont Pelee was storing up to hurl upon the island.
Several parties were at work clearing away the ruins, but slowly, for the government of the colony would not assist in the work, believing that the region was unsafe. At the time of this visit, Mont Pelée was still smoking. This was the ruined city which Stuart was going to see.
In itself this indentation is but a squab of the main Pigeon Bay, which stretches around for twenty miles and is formed of Pelee Point, the most southern extension of Canada. The nearer and lesser point is like a bit of the Mediterranean. It takes the greys of the rain-days with a beauty and power of its own, and the mornings flash upon it.
"I did say so, Miss Edith, and I think I may safely repeat my promise, provided we make camp a little later than usual this evening, and get started again by daylight to-morrow morning," answered the middle-aged lieutenant, who sat just back of the ladies and steered the boat. "Yon far-reaching land," he continued, "is Point Pelee, and from there the fort is only about twenty-five miles away."
The Roddam had been through the eruption of Mont Pelée, the only ship which escaped o' the eighteen that were in the harbor. She got away only because she made port just fifty-two minutes before the eruption, an' had been ordered to the quarantine station, some distance off." "Did you see anything of the eruption yourself?" "We knew that somethin' had happened, even down here in St. Lucia.
Lafcadio Hearn, many years after the slaves were freed, described the scene in Martinique as viewed from the slopes of Mont Pélée: "We look back over the upreaching yellow fan-spread of cane-fields, and winding of tortuous valleys, and the sea expanding beyond an opening to the west.... Far down we can distinguish a line of field-hands the whole atelier, as it is called, of a plantation slowly descending a slope, hewing the canes as they go.
Thomas T. Prentis, wife of the United States Consul at St. Pierre, to her sister in Melrose, a suburban city of Boston, that we quote it here: "My Dear Sister: This morning the whole population of the city is on the alert and every eye is directed toward Mont Pelee, an extinct volcano. Everybody is afraid that the volcano has taken into its heart to burst forth and destroy the whole island.
Children played in its bowers and arbors; families picnicked there day after day during the balmy weather; hundreds of tourists ascended to the summit and looked with pleasure at the beautiful crystal lake which sparkled and glinted in the sunshine. Mont Pelee was the place of enjoyment of the people of St. Pierre.
An amusing feature of office seeking is that each man desiring an office is apt to look down on all others with the same object as forming an objectionable class with which he has nothing in common. At the time of the eruption of Mt. Pelee, when among others the American Consul was killed, a man who had long been seeking an appointment promptly applied for the vacancy.
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