THE EARTH. 269 



pearance. Mr Buffon supposes the spout Tiere described, to 

 proceed from the operation of fire, beneath the bed of the sea ; 

 as the waters at the surface are thus seen agitated. However, the 

 solution of Dr Stuart is not divested of probability ; who thinks 

 it may be accounted for by suction, as in the application of a 

 cupping-glass to the skin. 



Wherever spouts of this kind are seen, they are extremely 

 dreaded by mariners ; for if they happen to fall upon a ship, 

 they most commonly dash it to the bottom. But if the ship be 

 large enough to sustain the deluge, they are at least sure to des- 

 troy its sails and rigging, and render it unfit for sailing. It is 

 said that vessels of any force usually tire their guns at them, 

 loaden with a bar of iron ; and if so happy as to strike them, the 

 water is instantly seen to fall from them with a dreadful noise, 

 though without any farther mischief. 



I am at a loss whether we ought to reckon these spouts called 

 typhous, which are sometimes seen at land, of the same kind 

 with those so often described by mariners at sea, as they seem 

 to differ in several respects. That, for instance, observed 

 at Katfield in Yorkshire, in 1687, as it is described by the per- 

 son who saw it, seems rather to have been a whirlwind than a 

 water-spout. The season in which it appeared was very dry, 

 the weather extremely hot, and the air very cloudy. After the 

 wind had blown for some time with considerable force, and con- 

 densed the black clouds one upon another, a great whirling of 

 the air ensued ; upon which the centre of the clouds every now 

 and then darted down, in the shape of a thick long black pipe ; 

 in which the relater could distinctly view a motion like that ot 

 a screw, continually screwing up to itself, as it were, whatever 

 it happened to touch. In its progress it moved slowly over a 

 grove of young trees, which it violently bent in a circular mo- 

 tion. Going forward to a barn, it, in a minute, stript it of all 

 the thatch, and filled the whole air with the same. As it came near 

 the relater, he perceived that its blackness proceeded from a 

 gyration of the clouds, by contrary winds meeting in a point, or 

 a centre ; and where the greatest force was exerted, there dart- 

 ing down like an Archimedes's screw, to suck up all that came 

 in its way. Another which he saw some time after was attend- 

 ed with still more terrible effects ; levelling or tearing up great 

 oak trees, catching up tne birds in its vortex, and dashing them 



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