VOLCANOES AND EARTHQUAKES. 261 



the ruins. It was calculated that 40,500 pe- 

 rished during the earthquake, and 20,000 more 

 died by epidemics, caused by insufficient nour- 

 ishment, exposure to cold and malaria, arising 

 from stagnant lakes and pools, which were 

 formed from the effects of the earthquake. By 

 far the greater number of the sufferers were 

 buried under the ruins of their houses, but many 

 were burnt to death in the conflagrations which 

 almost always followed the shocks. Immense 

 magazines of oils were consumed, ready for 

 exportation, and which occasioned the fires to 

 rage more violently. Many persons were en- 

 gulfed in deep fissures made in the earth, espe- 

 cially the peasants, while flying across the open 

 country, and their skeletons may now lie buried 

 at the depth of several hundred feet. 



A gentleman who visited the town of Polis- 

 tena, in Calabria, after the earthquake, says, 

 " The scene of horror which presented itself 

 almost deprived me of my faculties. My mind 

 was filled with mingled compassion and terror 

 nothing had escaped all was levelled with 

 the dust not a single house or piece of wall 

 remained on all sides were heaps of stones, 

 whieh gave the idea that there could never 



