To add to their distress, the air was filled for several days
with thick clouds of earthy particles and cinders, which blinded
the men, and made respiration exceedingly difficult. *11 This
phenomenon, it seems probable, was caused by an eruption of the
distant Cotopaxi, which, about twelve leagues southeast of Quito,
rears up its colossal and perfectly symmetrical cone far above
the limits of eternal snow, - the most beautiful and the most
terrible of the American volcanoes. *12 At the time of Alvarado's
expedition, it was in a state of eruption, the earliest instance
of the kind on record, though doubtless not the earliest. *13
Since that period, it has been in frequent commotion, sending up
its sheets of flame to the height of half a mile, spouting forth
cataracts of lava that have overwhelmed towns and villages in
their career, and shaking the earth with subterraneous thunders,
that, at the distance of more than a hundred leagues, sounded
like the reports of artillery! *14 Alvarado's followers,
unacquainted with the cause of the phenomenon, as they wandered
over tracts buried in snow, - the sight of which was strange to
them, - in an atmosphere laden with ashes, became bewildered by
this confusion of the elements, which Nature seemed to have
contrived purposely for their destruction. Some of these men
were the soldiers of Cortes, steeled by many a painful march, and
many a sharp encounter with the Aztecs. But this war of the
elements, they now confessed, was mightier than all.
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