l8o8.] the late Earthquakes in Southern I tali/. 529 



repetition of the shock at midniglit ruined the towns of Reggio and 

 Messina, and convulsed the whole Valdemone. At the entrance 

 of the Faro Straits, the sea, retiring from the Calabrian sliore and 

 afterwards rushing back with overwhelming violence, swept away 

 more than 1500 inhabitants of the town of Scylla, who had taken 

 refuge on the beach for safety. After a succession of slight shocks, 

 on the 28th of the following March, another violent shock con- 

 vulsed tlie whole country from Reggio to Cape Colonna, an area 

 of 1200 square miles, and added two thousand more to the number 

 of victims. Mountains were cleft asunder, high cliffs tumbled 

 down, rivers turned from their bed or dammed in their course, 

 lakes formed, valleys lifted up into hills, deep chasms opened, the 

 pliysical aspect of the country changed, all distinctions of property 

 altered. For twenty days a thick pestilential fog set over the 

 desolated country ; epidemic fevers followed in summer ; and at 

 the beginning of 1784 Calabria had already lost more than 80,000 

 iniiabitants. From February to December 1783, there were no 

 less than 949 shocks, and 151 in 1784; they did not altogether 

 cease till 1786. 



2. The mountain of Frosolone, in the province of Molise, the 

 ancient Samnium, on the 26th of July, 1804, at lOi p.m., was the 

 centre of a violent shock of earthquake, which lasted 35 seconds, 

 and caused great desolation over an area of 600 square miles. It 

 ruined 61 towns and villages, and crushed to death more than 

 6000 people. It was severely felt as far as Naples, where all the 

 buildings were greatly injured by its effects. 



3. On the 29th of April, 1835, and on several successive days, 

 the Val di Crati, in the province of Calabria Citra, including the 

 town of Coseuza and its numerous villages, was convulsed by 

 violent shocks of earthquake, which caused the death of more than 

 1000 people under the ruins. 



4. On the 12th of October, 1836, the districts of Rossano and 

 Castro villari, in the same province, and the district of Lagonegro, 

 in IJasilicata, felt another violent shock of earthquake, which swept 

 away more tlian 600 inhabitants. 



5. The city of Melfi, built on a spur of Mount Vulture, an 

 extinct volcano in the province of Basilicata, on the 14th of 

 August 1851, was the focus of a violent earthquake, which, besides 

 Melfi itself, ruined IJarile, Rapolla, and many other towns, and 

 was felt as far as Nai)les on the western, and Brindisi on the 

 eastern coast. The first shock, at 2 p.m., lasted 20 seconds ; the 

 second shock, at 3 p.m., lasted only five seconds. The loss of 

 human life exceeded 1400; Melfi alone, out of 9274, lost 1093 

 inhabitants. 



6. But worse than any of the later earthquakes, and second 

 only to the Calabrian one of 1783, was the earthquake which took 

 place on the 16th of December last, at lOj p.m., at a seiuson of the 

 year, which, by a comparison of all the known dates of ciirthquakes. 



