96 report — 1842. 



in Duneira House is slightly rent; one in the stable behind very much ; two 

 of the gardeners' cottages behind that again considerably; one so much that. 

 it was taken down and rebuilding when I saw it. The directions in which 

 the stones have been moved, seem to have been various. It is remarkable 

 that neither the row of chimney-stacks on the hot-house wall, of the same 

 construction with those of the gardener's cottage (octagonal), nor those of 

 the gamekeeper's house, which is a little up the hill, have been injured. 

 The gardener told me the foundation of all the buildings thereabout (except 

 the last) was upon a gravelly soil, but how near the subjacent rock he could 

 not guess. A person who happened to be on the hill or rising ground im- 

 mediately to the west of Duneira House, told me as a proof of the shock 

 having come even there from the west, that after the shock passed him he 

 heard the rattle of the slates and of the buildings about Duneira; but this 

 you will at once see was not evidence of the alleged fact. Another stand- 

 ing on the hill above, said that he thought he saw the disturbance of 

 the woods pass eastward. This was near Comrie. Those in the wooden 

 shed at the saw-mill near Duneira, saw the roof open for a moment ; and 

 when they rushed from the shed, they observed that the water in the mill- 

 head was for a short time dammed backwards, and raised about four inches 

 above its former level at that place ; and from this, and other indications, 

 they judged that the earth there was heaved directly upwards about six inches. 

 There were traces of electricity in the clouds at the time, and other pecu- 

 liarities in the appearance of the sky, but nothing amounting to the least 

 hint, so far as I could judge, that we were to be so roughly handled. I re- 

 collect before of noticing the appearance of the sky as lurid and particularly 

 sombre when we had quakings below, but I have frequently since seen the 

 same, or even stronger marks of the same kind, and yet all pass peaceably 

 off, and, on the other hand, earthquakes when the sky was clear and open. 

 Even a course of previous wet weather, which, from its being hitherto an 

 almost constant forerunner of the violent and frequent shocks, warranted 

 the inference that they were somehow connected, does not seem to be a sine 

 qua non ; so that the remark of a sagacious old man, one well-known here 

 as ' Deacon lleid,' will hold good, who long ago, in the first series of our 

 earthquakes, had been paying particular attention to the phenomena, and 

 being asked if he had made out whether they affected the weather or the 

 weather them, replied that he had attended particularly to that point, and all 

 that he could make of them was, that there was ' aye some kind o' weather 

 when they happened.' I may here add, it was omitted in its proper place, 

 that the only difference I could observe in the circumstances of the shattered 

 chimneys about Duneira, was that they were all on walls or gables running 

 south and north, while those untouched had the walls on which they stood 

 east and west. Dykes were thrown down in many places." 



With reference to the part of Mr. Macfarlane's letter last quoted, it may 

 be proper to explain, that the spot from which the Perthshire shocks of 

 earthquake appear to emanate, is situated about a mile north of Duneira, and 

 therefore it is not difficult to understand why walls running north and south 

 should chiefly or exclusively have been rent, whilst walls running east and 

 west should have escaped. ' This explains the fact mentioned in Mr. Mac- 

 farlane's letter, that the hot-house wall and range of chimneys on it escaped 

 injury, whilst the west gable of the house at Garrickrow (a quarter of a mile 

 east of Duneira House) was rent. 



Accounts have been received by a Member of the Committee, of the effects 

 produced by the same shock in other parts of the country, which in so far as 

 interesting, will be given in a treatise he is publishing on British earthquakes. 



