SOME FAMOUS EARTHQUAKES 



sections of cliff were broken off, in one instance for a 

 whole mile's length of coast. The sea and the neigh- 

 bourhood was greatly disturbed ; and soon after the fall 

 of the cliffs of Scylla the sea rose to a height of twenty 

 feet, and the wave rolling over the coast-line drowned 

 1500 people. 



Japan is perhaps as unstable an area as anywhere exists 

 on the earth, and the records of its earthquakes are more 

 complete- than in any other country. The number of 

 destructive earthquakes recorded there in the last fifteen 

 hundred years is 223. Since the beginning of the seven- 

 teenth century the records are fairly perfect, and it is 

 found that since then a destructive earthquake has 

 occurred somewhere in the Japanese islands nearly every 

 two and a half years. For the lighter shocks systematic 

 observation has become necessary, and the Japanese, with 

 that development of the scientific spirit which is so 

 remarkable an accompaniment of their progress during 

 the last generation, have organised an Earthquake 

 Recording Service a Seismological Bureau at which 

 such conspicuous meteorologists as Mr. John Milne and 

 Dr. Knott have worked, and which has produced great 

 seismologists among the Japanese themselves. As many 

 of our readers are aware, the earth is hardly ever still ; 

 it trembles continually like a boiling kettle, though not 

 for the same reasons; and the delicate instruments for 

 measuring earthquakes, which are called seismometers, 

 show continual earth tremors or earth shivers. Since 

 1888 the earthquakes of all intensities recorded in Japan 

 give a yearly average of 1447 shocks, or a daily average 



153 



