na is an object to make a deep
impression on the mind:

But for yon filmy smoke, that from thy crest
Continual issues like a morning mist
The sun disperses, there would be no sign
That from thy mighty breast bursts forth at times
The sulphurous storm--the avalanche of fire;
That midnight is made luminous, and day
A ghastly twilight, by thy lurid breath.
By thee tormented, Earth is tossed and riven:
The shuddering mountains reel; temples and towers
The works of man, and man himself, his hopes
His harvests, all a desolation made!
Sublime art thou, O Mount! whether beneath
The moon in silence sleeping with thy woods,
And driving snows, and golden fields of corn;
Or bleat on thy slant breast the gentle flocks,
And shepherds in the mellow glow of eve
Pipe merrily; or when thy scathed sides
Are laved with fire, answered thine earthquake voice
By screams and clamor of affrighted men.
Sublime thou art!--a resting-place for thought,
Thought reaching far above thy bounds; from thee
To HIM who bade the central fires construct
This wondrous fabric; lifted thy dread brow
To meet the sun while yet the earth is dark,
And ocean, with its ever-murmuring waves.

On the ninth of May, myself and travelling companion commenced the ascent
of Mount AEtna; and as the season was not the most favorable, the snows
extending farther down the sides of the mountain than in summer, we were
equipped, under the direction of our guide, with coarse woollen stockings
to be drawn over the pantaloons, thick-soled shoes, and woollen caps.
Mounting our mules, we left Catania in the morning. The road was good and
of gradual ascent until we reached Nicolosi, about fourteen miles up the
mountain. We saw little that was particularly interesting on our route
except that the hamlets through which we passed bore fearful evidences of
the effects of earthquake. Arrived at Nicolosi, the place where travellers
usually procure guides and mules for the mountain, it was our intention to
rest for the remainder of the day; but Monte Rosso, an extinguished
crater, being in the vicinity, my curiosity got the better of my intention
to rest, and I sallied forth to examine it. The road lay through the
village, which is built of the lava, and is arid and black, and many of
the buildings rent and twisted. Monte Rosso was formed by the eruption of
1669, which threw out a torrent of lava that flowed thirteen miles,
destroying