372 CALORIFICATION, 



I shall briefly detail one of the earthquakes 

 'which took place in Italy, in the year 1 793, 

 the particulars of which have been so ably 

 related by the late Sir WILLIAM HAMILTON. 

 From the month of January to the month of 

 May, the atmosphere was generally calm, and 

 the weather dry ; and for several days before 



bourhood, by mixing together different materials, and after 

 inhuming them to a considerable depth, an explosion or artifi- 

 cial earthquake was, after a given time, the consequence. In 

 the lectures that are delivered by Professor Davy, at the Royal 

 Institution, I find that he exhibited the very same pheno- 

 menon : he exhibited the model of a mountain made of clay, 

 in which was inclosed a mixture of potassium, filings of iron, 

 and lime. On pouring water into a fissure of this little mole 

 hill, violent combustion ensued, flame, and smoke were vo- 

 mited out of the little crater; boiling hot lava ran over the 

 surface, and spread over the side of the mountain; the whole 

 of which formed a most accurate exhibition of a volcanic erup- 

 tion. This very curious experiment was observed by the great 

 babies in petticoats and in breeches, as it had been done by 

 the little ones before^ with astonishment and universal ap- 

 plause. It is very probable, that it was exhibitions such as 

 these, that led Dr. Enfield to observe " that the hardy perse- 

 verance, and the rigorous exertions which are necessary to 

 form the character of a philosopher, are so contrary to that 

 effeminacy and frivolity which distinguish the present age, that 

 if it were not for the provisions made in our universities, and 

 other seminaries for the propagation of sound learning, it is 

 to be feared that the more abstruse and difficult branches of 

 science would be excluded from the modern sstem of edu- 



