Note 49 — LETTER VI.[45]
Reading edition
The flames Lord Winchelsea mentions, were certainly produced by the lava having met with trees in the way; or perhaps his Lordship may have mistaken the white smoak which constantly rises from a lava (and in the night is tinged by the reflection of the red hot matter), for flame, of which indeed it has greatly the appearance at a distance. I have observed upon Mount Vesuvius, that, soon after a lava has borne down and burned a tree, a bright flame issues from its surface; otherwise I have never seen any flame attending an eruption.