206 COSMOS. 



had attempted to possess themselves of the treasures of the 

 city. Neither on the surface of the earth, nor in mines 1600 

 feet in depth was the slightest shock to be perceived. No 

 similar noise had ever before been heard on the elevated table- 

 land of Mexico, nor has this terrific phenomenon since occurred 

 there. Thus clefts are opened or closed in the interior of the 

 Earth, by which waves of sound penetrate to us or are impeded 

 in their propagation. 



The activity of an igneous mountain, however terrific and 

 picturesque the spectacle may be which it presents to our con- 

 templation, is always limited to a very small space. It is far 

 otherwise with earthquakes, which, although scarcely percep- 

 tible to the eye, nevertheless simultaneously propagate their 

 waves to a distance of many thousand miles. The great 

 earthquake which destroyed the city of Lisbon, on the 1st of 

 November, 1755, and whose effects were so admirably inves- 

 tigated by the distinguished philosopher Emmanuel Kant, was 

 felt in the Alps, on the coast of Sweden, in the Antilles, Antigua, 

 Barbadoes, and Martinique ; in the great Canadian Lakes, in 

 Thuringia, in the flat country of Northern Germany, and in 

 the small inland lakes on the shores of the Baltic.* Remote 

 springs \vere interrupted in their flow, a phenomenon attend- 

 ing earthquakes which had been noticed amongst the ancients 

 by Demetrius the Callatian. The hot springs of Toplitz dried 

 up, and returned, inundating everything around, and having 

 their waters coloured with iron ochre. In Cadiz, the sea rose 

 to an elevation of sixty-four feet, whilst in the Antilles, where 

 the tide usually rises only from twenty-six to twenty-eight 

 inches, it suddenly rose above twenty feet, the water being of 

 an inky blackness. It has been computed that on the 1st of 

 November, 1755, a portion of the Earth's surface, four times 

 greater than that of Europe, was simultaneously shaken. As 

 yet there is no manifestation of force known to us, including 

 even the murderous inventions of our own race, by which a 



* [It has been computed that the shock of this earthquake pervaded 

 an area of 700,000 miles, or the twelfth part of the circumference of 

 tbe globe. This dreadful shock lasted only five minutes; it hap- 

 pened about nine o'clock in the morning of the Feast of All Saints, 

 when almost the whole population was within the churches, owing to 

 which circumstance no less than 30,000 persons perished by the fall of 

 these edifices. See Daubeney, On Volcanoes, pp. 514-517.] TV. 



