"Laborers from the sugar-cane fields (cañaverales) of the Hacienda de San Pedro Jorullo . . . had gone out to collect the fruit of the guayava. When they returned to the farm (hacienda) it was remarked with astonishment that their large straw hats were covered with volcanic ashes. Fissures had consequently already opened in what is now called the Malpais, probably at the foot of the high basaltic dome El Cuiche, which threw out ashes (lapilli) before any change appears to have occurred in the plain. . . .
"In the first hours of the night, the black ashes already lay a foot deep; every one fled toward the hill of Aguasarco, a small Indian village, situated 2,409 feet higher than the old plain of Jorullo.
"From this height (so runs the tradition) a large tract of land was seen in a state of fearful fiery eruption, and, 'in the midst of the flames (as those who witnessed the ascent of the mountain expressed themselves), there appeared, like a black castle (castillo negro), a great shapeless mass (bulto grande).’
"From the small population of the district (the cultivation of indigo and cotton was then but very little carried on), even the force of long-continued earthquakes cost no human lives, although, as I learn from manuscript record, houses were overturned by them near the copper-mines of Inguaran, in the small town of Pátzcuaro, in Santiago de Ario, and many miles farther, but not beyond San Pedro Churumucu. In the Hacienda de Jorullo, during the general nocturnal flight, they forgot to remove a deaf and dumb negro slave. A mulatto had the humanity to return and save him, while the house was still standing. It is still related that he was found kneeling, with a consecrated taper in his hand, before the picture of Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe.
"According to the tradition, widely and concordantly spread among the natives, the eruption during the first days consisted of great masses of rock, scoriæ, sand, and ashes, but always combined with an effusion of muddy water. In the memorable report already mentioned, of the 19th of October, 1759, the author of which was a man who, possessing an accurate knowledge of the locality, describes what had only just taken place, it is expressly said: ’Que espele el dicho. Volcan arena, ceniza y agua’
"All eye-witnesses relate . . . that, before the terrible mountain made its appearance, . . . the earthquakes and subterranean noises became more frequent; but, on the day of the eruption itself, the flat soil was seen to rise perpendicularly, . . . and the whole became more or less inflated, so that blisters (vexigones) appeared, of which the largest is now the volcano. . . .
"These inflated blisters of very various sizes, and partly of a tolerably regular conical form, subsequently burst . . . and threw boiling-hot earthy mud from their orifices, . . . as well as scoriaccous stony masses, . . .