Geography: a water spout in the South Atlantic Ocean. Coloured lithograph by A. Aglio, 1824, after P. Schmidtmeyer.

"On the 5th of April, being in latitude 20° S., and still in the midst of storms and squalls, we saw a water spout a few miles from us, which lasted twelve or fifteen minutes from its formation to its bursting: it reached about midway to the sea from the dense clouds with which it was connected; and when it burst, looked as if holes had been made round its lower end, in a few circles at regular intervals from each other, in order to discharge its contents, which issued copiously and beautifully: after this, there only remained a faint form of the spout, which was incorporated with the cloud above it, and whose appearance might be compared to that of a large snake, which, having let part of his body down from a cloud, was again drawing it up into it, after spouting water from a head perforated for that purpose. The effect to our view was not that of the water rising from the sea to the spout, but of falling from the spout to the sea. The annexed plate is from a sketch taken shortly after its bursting"--Schmidtmeyer, loc. cit.