94 Mr D, Milno oi Earthquake-Shocks felt in Great Britain^ 



quake !' — ' It is tlio same sort of sound (he added) that we 

 heard the other daj^ in the harvest field.' I took observation 

 of the time, and all this passed while 3'et the sound of it was 

 heard ; we concluded that it lasted above 50 seconds. As to 

 the sort of sound, it resembled in its approach a multitude of 

 coal wajjgons on a railroad somewhat as to sound, but chiefly 

 as to the motion produced ; there was a quick vibration. My 

 house stands on a bed of channel. There is another near it 

 on mossy ground, and there the shock was felt as a heave. 

 The inhabitant imagined, being in bed, that some huge ani- 

 mal had got beneath his bed and was bearing up the bed to 

 get from beneath. No walls cracked in this neighbourhood, 

 so far as I can learn, but there were several bursts of earth, 

 and slides on the sides of the hills, and breakings of wellheads. 

 Birds' cages moved like pendulums. Noise accompanied, pre- 

 ceded, and followed the shock. The noise was continuous, 

 with variation of the sounds. The sound was first like the 

 distant sound of carriages on the public road ; as it approached 

 it grew deep and hollow from the earth, and passed away like 

 the effect produced by a close body of cavalry in quick march 

 over a common. It was in the earth. The concussions were 

 most felt in the upper parts of houses. Doors upstairs in my 

 house, were thrown open and moved on their hinges. From 

 all I can collect, it appears it was not so much felt in houses 

 on the hill sides, as in the houses along the bottom of the range ; 

 the houses on the hills are mostly built on rock, those along 

 the bottom of the hills on gravel or loose soil. We had much 

 rain previously. One night, in the end of September, from 

 8 in the evening to 8 next morning, as nearly as I could ascer- 

 tain, there fell about 1 inch of water in thickness on the ground. 

 ]3esides .shooting stars, some nights after I sawthe most splendid 

 meteor I ever witnessed. It was passing from the west to the 

 east, and proceeded in a line parallel to the earth's surface." 



At Woodcot, near Dollar, about 22 miles S.S.E. from 

 Comrie, the shocks and the state of the weather at the 

 time, are thus described by Mr Walker. " The first con- 

 cussion felt here was at 10'^ 10' p.m. on the 23d of October, 

 the second about half-an-hour afterwards. The noise pre- 

 ceding the first, lasted about four or five seconds ; in the second 



