A GREAT SEA- WAVE. 195 



and shocks by which whole cities are changed into a 

 heap of ruins are by no means infrequent. Yet even 

 in Peru, ' the land of earthquakes,' as Humboldt has 

 termed it, no such catastrophe as that of August 1868 

 had occurred within the memory of man. It was not 

 one city which was laid in ruins, but a whole empire. 

 Those who perished were counted by tens of thousands, 

 while the property destroyed by the earthquake was 

 valued at millions of pounds sterling. 



Although so many months have passed since this 

 terrible calamity took place, scientific men have been 

 busily engaged until quite recently in endeavouring to 

 ascertain the real significance of the various events 

 which were observed during and after the occurrence 

 of the earthquake. The geographers of Germany have 

 taken a special interest in interpreting the evidence 

 afforded by this great manifestation of nature's powers. 

 Two papers have been written recently on the great 

 earthquake of August 13, 1868, one by Professor Von 

 Hochstetter, the other by Herr Von Tschudi, which 

 present an interesting account of the various effects, 

 by land and by sea, which resulted from the tre- 

 mendous upheaving force to which the western flanks 

 of the Peruvian Andes were subjected on that day. 

 The effects on land, although surprising and terrible, 

 yet only differ in degree from those which have been 

 observed in other earthquakes. But the progress 

 of the great sea-wave which was generated by the 

 upheaval of the Peruvian shores and propagated over 

 the whole of the Pacific Ocean differs altogether from 



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