TORNADO AT PINE PLAINS. 335 



Destructive Tornado. 



[From the Poughkeepsie Journal.] 



179. On Saturday, about six o'clock, P. M., the town of 

 Pine Plains was visited by one of the most destructive tem- 

 pests this part of the country ever experienced. The day 

 was very sultry, and towards three o'clock in the afternoon, 

 clouds began to darken in the horizon, highly charged with 

 the electric fluid, as was apparent from the incessant glare 

 of lightning and continual war of thunder ; the clouds 

 mixed angrily together, which rendered the aspect sublime 

 and beautiful, till about six o'clock, when the watery ele- 

 ments became more reconciled, and veered to the north of 

 us, with little or no rain. At this juncture, our attention 

 was arrested by the peculiar mano3uvring of dark and heavy 

 clouds a little south of west, appearing above the Stissing 

 Mountains, about one mile distant. 



As the black cloud arose, (it had the appearance and 

 commotion of dense volumes of smoke bursting from a 

 burning building,) light and windy clouds from all that part 

 of the heavens, veered toward it with unspeakable confu- 

 sion and velocity, apparently making it their common cen- 

 tre and were lost in its power. At our place of observa- 

 tion, in the village, a dead calm pervaded, which rendered 

 this exhibition of Almighty power, together with its deafen- 

 ing war, an appalling spectacle to the beholder. After it 

 crossed the Stissing, our view was fairer, the dark cloud 

 with its attendants, kept close to the earth, extending up- 

 ward about half way to the zenith, and, as if unable to 

 sustain its power, was seen to burst several times, produc- 

 ing new rains ; where these descending gusts struck, such 

 were their fury, that nothing could resist ; even the earth 

 itself, trembled at their terrific explosions, trees, limbs, 

 rails, boards, hogsheads, &c., mingled with the heavens, as 



