La Pelée.
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French West Indian colonies to designate certain altitudes of volcanic origin, a term rather unsatisfactorily translated in certain dictionaries as " a small mountain," is justly applied to the majority of Martinique hills, and unjustly sometimes even to its mightiest elevation,— called Morne Pelé, or Montagne Pelée, or simply " La Montagne," according, perhaps, to the varying degree of respect it inspires in different minds. But even in the popular nomenclature one finds the orography of Martinique, as well as of other West Indian islands, regularly classified by pitons, mornes, and monts or montagnes. Mornes usually have those beautiful and curious forms which bespeak volcanic origin even to the unscientific observer : they are most often pyramidal or conoid up to a certain height ; but have summits either rounded or truncated ;—^their sides, green with the richest vegetation, rise from valley-levels and coast-lines with remarkable abruptness, and are apt to be curiously ribbed or wrinkled. The pitons, far fewer in number, are much more fantastic in form ;—volcanic cones, or volcanic upheavals of splintered strata almost at right angles,— sometimes sharp of line as spires, and mostly too steep for habitation. They are occasionally mammiform, and so symmetrical that one might imagine them artificial creations,—particularly when they occur in pairs. Only a very important mass is dignified by the name montagne : there are, as I have already observed, but two thus called in all Martinique,—-Pelée, the head and summit of the island ; and La Montagne du Vauclin, in the south-east. Vauclin is inferior in height and bulk to several mornes and pitons of the north and north-west,—and owes its distinction probably to its position as centre of a system of ranges : but in altitude and mass and majesty, Pelée far outranks everything in the island, and well deserves its special appellation, " L a Montagne." N o description could give the reader a just idea of what