410 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. 



that large blocks were forced up the acclivity, and nearly reached their situation. The 

 movement was so sudden, that nine out of thirteen travellers who happened to be passing 

 were overwhelmed, and the mass that fell was so prodigious, that it formed a ridge in 

 the valley one hundred feet in height, and a league and a half in length and breadth. 

 In little more than five minutes, the greater part of the whole vale of Goldau was trans 

 formed from a happy and cultivated retreat into a mass of ruins. The villages of 

 Goldau, Busingan, Lowerz, Ober and Unter Rother, were either entirely or in part 

 buried ; four hundred and eighty-four of the inhabitants lost their lives ; a great 

 number of cattle and sheep perished ; and property destroyed, according to an estimate 

 made by the government of the canton, to the amount of nearly 100,000/. A portion 

 of the mountain dashing into the lake of Lowerz raised a succession of vast waves, 

 one of which swept over the small island of Schwanan, though sixty feet above the 

 ordinary level of the water. The cause of this tremendous occurrence was not doubt 

 ful. About half a century before the year 1806, some considerable rents of great depth 

 had been formed in Mont Ruffi, by which the water of the rains and melted snows, 

 as well as some from the adjacent lakes, Avas freely admitted into the interior of the 

 mountain. The marl and clay which united the strata of conglomerate exposed to its 

 action was gradually washed away, depriving the upper masses of the foundation on which 

 from immemorial time they had securely rested, which were precipitated forwards upon 

 being displaced. On the site once occupied by the village of Goldau there is now a 

 small chapel, where the pious Switzers pray for preservation from a similar calamity, 

 holding a service for the purpose annually on the 2d of September. 



A disruption, equally sudden but far more fatal in its effects, took place in the year 1618 

 with reference to Mont Conto, which formerly overlooked a pleasant and well-built town 

 and adjacent village in the Val Bregaglia, in the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom. Of the 

 particulars we have less information than in the former case, as it happened in the night. 

 While the air was culm, the sky cloudless, arid most of the people of the valley were 

 wrapt in sleep, the summit of the mountain came down, completely burying the town 

 with its ruins, upon which a forest of chestnuts now flourishes. Only one house escaped 

 destruction, and three inhabitants who were absent on business, 2430 persons perishing. 

 There had been beforehand intimations of danger sufficient to have induced observant and 

 reflecting persons, aware of the dreadful incidents to which such localities are subject, to 

 have removed to a safer spot. For ten years previous, large chasms had been formed 

 in the mountains, into which the rains descended, and ultimately wrought the mischiefs 

 that occurred. On the afternoon before the fatal night some fragments of rock had 

 fallen ; but in the spirit of confident and happy security, the inhabitants of the Val 

 Bregaglia retired to rest among their native and much-loved mountains, and saw them 

 no more! It has been correctly enough observed, that " until the fatal moment of 

 destruction arrives, or, at all events, till the hour of danger approaches, mankind, all the 

 world over, are pretty nearly equally indifferent, and go on dancing and singing, marrying 

 and giving in marriage, under the very jaws of death, with as much unconcern as if they 

 were living in perfect safety. The inhabitants of Portici and Resina, for instance, living 

 at the base of Vesuvius ; or those of Catania, at the foot of mount Etna, where torrent 

 upon torrent of lava has flowed in endless succession, never dream of an eruption till 

 the parched volcano drinks up their wells, and, in the language of Scripture, ' fire runs 

 along the ground ! ' " In like manner the writer remarks, " I have observed the gay 

 voluptuaries of Lima scarcely disturbed in their reckless enjoyment of life by the shock 

 of an earthquake, which interrupted only for a transient moment of fear and impatient 

 prayer their darling ' Tertullas,' while the ceilings and walls of their houses cracked in 

 their ears, and church steeples toppled round them." It is clear that in the two preceding 



