EARTHQUAKES. ]..-.. 



and kn..\\ l.-.li;.- that tin atl'i i<_ r h ted people were invoking the mercy of their God in th<- utmoct 

 distress, and the ratth !' \\ind..\\sand doors was making no small addition to the uproar, still 

 i-iil s(.-rondn must have elapsed before I COllld rcali/c the actual magnitude- of the Kturm 

 agitating tin- mist of our abiding-place. Nevertheless, experience having taught that tin; 

 phenomenon is nt little continuance, there was sufficient rationality to prevent my leaving the 

 room; ami I stood with .scn.scs gradually returning, thinking each vibration would be the laat. 

 Hut 1 watched and watched the dial of the monitor in my hand, and, instead of subsidence, 

 there came accessions to the force of the moving power with each beat of its balance-wheel, till 

 the walls on either side were swaying to and fro, the plank ceiling screeching overhead, and 

 finally the doors flew open, exhibiting the opposite room filled with a cloud of dust, and it* 

 floor covered with broken adobes, which had fallen between the ceiling and walls. Half a 

 minute had now elapsed, each second of which seemed at least a day ; and in the fiercest vio- 

 lence, as the creaking of the ceiling was too ominous to disregard longer, I found myself creeping 

 for shelter beneath the lintel of the door. Of a sudden the wall swayed away from the roof, 

 showing the blue sky above, and a mass of rubbish fell, blinding and almost stifling me; 

 so that it became necessary to take refuge under the lintel of the outside door, where fresh air 

 might be obtained. As the tiles were falling in a shower from the roofs, escape to the patio 

 was more hazardous than to remain under the doorway ; for one had better risk being partially 

 buried than have his head split with one of these heavy pieces of earthenware. 



The motion had now became fearful, and the roar of the pent up vapor, as it moved heavily 

 along, most awful ; yet every little while there would reach me the clear ringing laugh of one 

 of the assistants inspired by the efforts of a companion to attain a place of greater apparent 

 safety marked contrasts of expressed human sensations in this terrestrial convulsion. I was 

 not conscious of fear at any instant, nor was it possible to make the mind realize that the house 

 might fall, although the walls were breaking all round, and at every few seconds the sky was 

 visible through their crevices ; but there was a sensation of dread a feeling of absolute insig- 

 nificance in the presence of a power that shook the Andes as willows in the breeze. I was hum- 

 bled to the dust. Afterwards I learned, that among the mass in the streets there was but one 

 thought, one desire -flight. But where fly to? The massive stone arches of the sanctuary had 

 been broken, their key-stones had partially fallen, and the priests had been driven from the altars 

 by masses of masonry precipitated around them ; the hills were shaking huge rocks from crests 

 where they had slumbered since the dawn of nature, their trains marked by streams of fire ; 

 in the streets tiles were falling in showers mid clouds of dust; and on the open plain, in addi- 

 tion to that most unearthly and distressing noise and the moaning of cattle in their brute ter- 

 ror, the trees were waving from side to side under the influence of that same unseen but omni- 

 potent agent. 



Preceded some seconds by the usual rumbling noise, the first shook commenced at 6A. 48m. 

 10s. A. M., and for eighteen seconds continued with nearly uniform violence, equal to, and in 

 the kind of motion not altogether unlike that of December 6th. This started the tiles and 

 walls, though it broke nothing, a fact which may perhaps be accounted for by the greater 

 rapidity with which the atoms at the surface of the earth were disturbed on the last occasion ; 

 for, if one may judge from bodily sensations, the shaking was certainly as great as in December, 

 though the effects were much less. The most excessive displacements were between 6A. 48m. 

 28s. and 6A. 48m. 53s ; and at Qh. 49m. 38s. terminated an earthquake unparalleled in central 

 Chile since 1822. Less than one minute and a half: a brief period of one's life when marked only 

 by events of ordinary transpiration but an age when one stands on a world convulsed. Begin- 

 ning at Qh. 48m. 28s., the oscillations, then quite distinct, rapid, and abrupt, were of such mag- 

 nitude that one involuntarily sought support ; and though this actually lasted only twenty-five 

 seconds, the time seemed endless, when measured by the multitude of thoughts crowded into it. 

 Liquids were tossed to the north and south ; and at the end, the surface of the mercury in a cup 

 with vertical sides was left 1.4 inch below the rim. A barometer suspended on a north and south 



