94 Mr Milne on Ear thquake^Shocks felt in Great Britain. 



tempt has been made to record the observed phenomena, or 

 point out the inferences which they seem to warrant. The 

 results which have been already derived from the register of 

 shocks kept at Comrie in Perthshire, since October 1839, are 

 very important, and fairly warrant the presumption, that much 

 valuable information might be derived from the phenomena 

 observed at earlier periods, and in all parts of the country. 

 Impressed with this conviction, the author has endeavoured to 

 rescue from oblivion that information ; and he rejoices to find 

 that the expectation which prompted the inquiry, has been 

 fully realized. The historical register which he now presents 

 as the first fruit of his researches, will be admitted by every 

 one who peruses it, to contain data from which important re- 

 sults may be derived. 



It is proper, however, to premise, that this register, com- 

 piled as it has been chiefly from notices in magazines and 

 other periodicals, must not be too implicitly relied on for the 

 correctness of every particular fact related in it. The value of 

 the register consists in its presenting a great body of evidence 

 to the occurrence of facts similar in character, as accompany- 

 ing earthquake-shocks in all parts of the country, and it is only 

 in so far as it does exhibit facts possessing such corroboration, 

 that reliance is claimed for it, as a safe foundation for philo- 

 sophical inference. 



It is proper here to say, in acknowledgment of the sources 

 from which some of the information in this register has been 

 derived, that, with regard to the Comrie shocks, most of them 

 are given as recorded by the Rev. Mr Gilfillan, a very intel- 

 ligent clergyman who resided for about thirty years in that 

 town. He was in the practice of noting in a private journal 

 that he kept, not only the dates of any shocks which occurred, 

 but also any striking effects or appearances which accompanied 

 them. This practice was so well known, that the wags in his 

 neighbourhood gave him the title of " Secretary to the Earth- 

 quakes." Extracts from Mr Gilfillan' s journal have been 

 most obligingly furnished to the author by his son, who is 

 now a clergyman in Stirling ; and a very important letter by 

 the " Secretary" himself, addressed to Sir Thomas Dick 

 Lauder in .July 1817, will be found embodied in the register. 

 To Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, the author is farther indebted 

 for various extracts from newspapers and other periodicals, of 



