Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
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to between 20 and 25 metres (70 and 80 feet) in circumference,
and had become the sea-washed platform for an explosive display
of fountains of fire 180 metres (600 feet) high.
The island grew and grew until by 22 July it was a 1.2 km
(three-quarters of a mile) circuit, and 25 metres (eighty feet) high
on its northwest side. Following the naval oicers, armed with
telescopes, sextants, plumb lines and flags, came the scientists
with notebooks, barometers and bottles: Carlo Gemmellaro
from Sicily, Friedrich Hoffmann from Germany, Constant
Prévost from France, and for Britain Dr John Davy, the head
of the Medical Corps in Malta, and younger brother of Sir
Humphry Davy. They measured and noted and sniffed at the
sulphurous air: Prévost asserted that the event was like uncork-
ing a bottle of champagne, while Davy likened it to pistol shots
and musket fire.² Prévost named it 'Ile Julie' because it had
arisen in July; Captain Senhouse of the
Hind
, planting the
Union Jack, considered the eruption to be a 'permanent island' on
2 August.³ As a compliment to the First Lord of the Admiralty,
Sir James Graham, he named it 'Graham Island': there's flat-
tery. A second Union Jack was planted when Alick Osborne,
5British School,
Graham Island
, 1831,
watercolour.
