No. Y II. -^Islands of Procida and Ischia. 33^ 



well as on account of the damage which it produced. On the 

 2d of February 1828, at eleven o'clock in the forenoon, a violent 

 shock of an earthquake was felt in the north-eastern part of the 

 island of Ischia, which lasted four seconds, accompanied with 

 an undulatory and vibratory motion, which produced great de- 

 vastation in the village of Casamicciola, where it was principally 

 felt. Many houses were destroyed at the instant, and others 

 so much shattered as to be in danger of falling : twenty-nine 

 persons were buried in the ruins, and many others wounded : 

 —much fear was entertained of greater convulsions, but these 

 were happily averted. The shock was felt over almost the 

 whole island, and appears to have commenced at the base of 

 Monto Epomeo, and stretched through Casamicciola to Lacco, 

 a village to the westward. The^air was still, and the sky 

 cloudy ; for four days the barometer had maintained its level 

 with little variation, but after the earthquake it fell, though 

 apparently not to a great extent. * Tiiese particulars are ex- 



* The connection of earthquakes with variations of the barometer, if 

 such connection exists, is a curious subject of inquiry, for upon few mat- 

 ters of fact has there been such direct evidence both for and against the 

 connection. Humboldt, whose means of infannation in South America 

 were extensive, mentions {Pers. Narr. ii. 224.) that no such connection is 

 observed in places affected by earthquakes, yet contrary facts might easily 

 be adduced. During the great earthquake of Lisbon, the fall, if 1 remem- 

 ber right, was very general. During the earthquakes in Calabria in 1783, 

 it fell to 27.88 at Lyndon. {Phil. Trans. 1781.) The surprising depres- 

 sion in December 1821 accompanied the eruption in Iceland and an earth- 

 quake at Mayence. A similar phenomenon was observed as far north as 

 Norway during the first great eruption of Vesuvius in 1822 ; and the ex- 

 traordinary depression in February 1823 was perhaps connected with an 

 earthquake felt at sea at the same period. {Ed. P/ul. Journ. x. 378.) 

 Though I cannot say that we have symptoms of the slight Ischian earth- 

 quake affecting the barometer in this country any more than on the spot, 

 there can be no doubt of the influence of the succeeding eruption of Ve- 

 suvius, March 21, on the barometer at Edinburgh, which attained a very 

 considerable depression that day, as the following observations prove : — 

 March 20, 1828, 84 m. 28.80G temp. 53., 10 m. 28.770-55., 5 a. 28.674-55., 

 10 a. 28.650-55. March 21, 9 m. 28.512-50., 10 m. 28.500-52., 5 a. 28.498- 

 53., 8 a. 28.592-55., 10 a. 28.614-55. A tremendous earthquake occur- 

 red on the 21st March 1829 in Murcia in Spain. I observed a consider- 

 able depression of the barometer near Edinburgh on the 20th, after which 

 it rose almost an nich in twenty-four hours. The shock felt at Copen- 

 hagen, 21 St August 1829, is said to have occasioned a most extraordinary 

 rise of the barometer there. The most careful comparison of the state 



NEW SERIES. VOL. II, NO. II. APRIL 1830. Y 



