382 On the Earthquake iu Colombia, 



crush the beholder, give but a faint idea of this desolate pic- 

 ture. General Soublette and General Bolivar were both pre- 

 sent at the last fatal earthquake in Caraccas, and they both 

 assert that this, of which I have now given a description, was 

 at least as powerful, although the suffering in the town of Ca- 

 raccas was much greater ; and they attribute the happy escape 

 of thousands of lives to the difference in the construction of 

 the houses in the two places. General Bolivar, as well as my- 

 self and others were affected with sickness at the stomach, after 

 the shock. During the night of the earthquake in Bogota on 

 the 16th of November, 1827, tremulous motions of the earth 

 •were continually felt, and the following day, and every other 

 since; and even whilst I am now writing, slight undulating mo- 

 tions are perceptible. 



Every person is still in the greatest alarm, dreading a second 

 severe shock, which happened last year at the distance of four 

 days from the first grand shock; should this happen now, 

 scarcely one stone will remain upon another in Bogota. 



Native Sulphate of Alumine, or Davite. 



This mineral salt occurs near a Thermal spring which con- 

 tains free sulphuric acid, at Chiwachi, an Indian village in the 

 Andes, one day's journey from Bogota, in Colombia,. It ex- 

 ists in mass of a white, green, or yellow colour; these differ- 

 ences of colour indicate some changes in the difference of com- 

 position. The yellow variety contains sulphate of iron, the 

 green, sulphate of copper also ; but the white is solely sulphate 

 of alumine. The copper and iron may be considered as ex- 

 traneous substances. AVhen a portion of the mass is separated, 

 the fracture, if examined by a lens, exhibits a multitude of 

 fine silky crystals, resembling the crystals of sulphate of qui- 

 nine ; its taste is nauseous and highly astringent. 



Before the blow-pipe on charcoal, it first gives out its water, 

 next sulphurous and sulphuric acids, and ultimately becomes 

 a white powder. Under the blue flame this powder appears 

 snow-white ; fused with borax and nitrate of cobalt, it gives a 

 fine blue glass. The salt is very soluble in water, leaving a 

 little impurity undissolved ; the solution changes the vegetable 



