EARTHQUAKES. 



255 



on more careful examination, it shall be proved that the 

 earthy matter coverins the ancient city of Ougein, and the 

 beds of tufa-like deposits on the banks of the ?, erbudda, and 

 in many other parts of Malwah and Baghur, agree in char- 

 acters with the matters that cover Pompeu and Hercula- 

 neum, &c., we shall be entitled to infer that the Hindoo 

 " shower of ashes" proceeded from some volcano or volca- 

 noes, the remainsof which may still be found in India. 



6. EARTHQUAKES. 



The mountains, hills, valleys, and littoral plains of India 

 are sometimes agitated by subterranean concussions or 

 earthquakes ; but these tremblings and heaymgs of the solid 

 mass of the country are not so frequent in India as mmany 

 other regions. Earthquakes are recorded as having occur- 

 red in the course of the Ganges in 1665, 1763, and m 18u0. 

 In 1803 an earthquake in the course of the Ganges occa- 

 sioned great disasters, particularly at Barahat. But these 

 agitations of the ground are not confined to the middle and 

 lower parts of the course of this river, for Captain Hodg- 

 son experienced an earthquake near to its sources. He. 

 savs, " We lay down to rest ; but between ten and eleven 

 o'clock were awakened by the rocking of the ground, and 

 on runnincT out we saw the eftects of an earthquake, and 

 the dreadful situation in which we were placed, in the midst 

 of masses of rock, some of them more than 100 feet in di- 

 ameter, and which had fallen from the ciitis above us, prob- 

 ably broucrht down by some former earthquake. I he scene 

 around ul, shown in all its dangers by the bright moon- 

 lio-ht, was indeed very awful. On the second shock, rocks 

 w'ere hurled in every direction from the peaks around to the 

 bed of the river, with a hideous noise not to be described, 

 and never to be forgotten. After the crash caused by the 

 falls near us had ceased, we could still hear the terrible 

 sounds of heavy falls in the more distant recesses of tlie 

 mountains. We looked up with dismay at the clihs over- 

 head, expecting that the next shock would detach some 

 ruins from them : had they fallen we could not have es- 

 caped, as the fragments from the summits would have tum- 

 bled over our heads, and we should have been buned by 

 those from the middle. Providentially there were no more 

 shocks that night. This earthquake was felt in all parts 



