Note 14 — LETTER III.

In some accounts of an eruption of Vesuvius in 1660, I find mention made of ashes which fell in the shape of crosses, and were looked upon as highly miraculous; but in one book upon this subject, intituled, Athanasii Kircheri Soc. Jes. De prodigiosis crucibus, &c. Romæ, mdclxi, a very philosophical account is given of this phænomenon; he says, that, in 1660, from the 16th of August to the 15th of October, Vesuvius cast up ashes, impregnated with nitrous, saline, and bituminous sulphur, which upon linen garments took the form of crosses, probably directed by the cross-threads in the linen, and therefore that the salts did not shoot into such a shape when they fell upon garments of woollen; a very particular description of these crosses may be found in page 38, of the abovementioned book.