Column of Smoke is a scientific illustration of an erupting volcano, drawn for the purpose of studying Mount Vesuvius. However, because scientific studies of volcanoes were still not taken seriously, this image went unappreciated for decades.

As noted by curator Andrew Stevens (Chazen Museum, University of Wisconsin), this “painting is a pastiche of second-hand Italianate architecture and geography imagery supplemented with the artist's own knowledge of Welsh mountain vistas.

During the latter part of their honeymoon in 1837-38, Hannah Palmer and her husband Samuel, also a painter and a follower of William Blake, spent much time sketching at Pompeii. For this view, she chose a recently uncovered portion of the city.

Like "The Hindoo Woman and her Babe," this illustration and its accompanying text serve to valorize British society by favorably comparing it to a non-Christian, foreign culture. In the text accompanying this particular image, the methods of education in Arab culture are described not simply as inadequate, but also as unkind and unenlightened in its exclusion of girls.