VOt. XVIII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 627 



house shake, and saw the bricks begin to rise in the floor. Immediately we 

 ran out, and saw the houses swallowed up, or thrown on heaps. The sand in 

 the street rose like the waves of the sea, lifting up all persons that stood upon 

 it, and immediately dropping down into pits ; and at the same instant a flood 

 of water rushed in, throwing down all who were in its way ; some were seen 

 catching hold of beams and rafters of houses, others were found in the sand 

 that appeared when the water was drained away, with their legs and arms out. 

 As soon as the shock was over, I endeavoured to go towards my house, on the 

 ruins of the houses that were floating on the water, but could not: at length I 

 got a canoe, and rowed up the great sea side towards my house, where I saw 

 several men and women floating upon the wreck out at sea; and taking in as 

 many as I could, I rowed on till I came where I thought my house had stood, 

 but could not hear of either my wife or family. Next morning I went from 

 one ship to another, till at length I met with my wife and two of my negroes. 

 She told me, when she felt the house shake, she ran out, and called all within 

 to do the same: she was no sooner out, but the sand lifted up: and her negro 

 women grasping about her, they both dropped into the earth together; and at 

 the same instant the water coming in, rolled them over and over, till at length 

 they caught hold of a beam, where they hung, till a boat came from a Spanish 

 vessel, and took them up. 



Several ships were over-set and lost in the harbour; and some thrown on the 

 land. A hideous rumbling was heard in the mountains; so that it frightened 

 many negroes that had been run away some months from their masters, and 

 made them return, and promise never to run away again. 



The water that issued from the Saltpans Hills forced its passage out from 

 the hill in 20 or 30 several places; some with such violence, that had so many 

 sluices been drawn up at once, they could not have run with greater force; and 

 most of them 6 or 7 yards high from the foot of the hill; and the water was 

 brackish. It continued running that afternoon, all night, and till next morn- 

 ing about sun-rise, at which time the Saltpans were quite overflowed. 



The mountains between Spanish Town and Sixteen Mile-Walk, as the way 

 lies along the river, about the mid-way they are almost perpendicular; those 

 two mountains, in the violent shake of the earthquake, joined together, which 

 stopped the passage of the river, and forced it to seek another, which was a 

 great way in and out among the woods and savannas; and it was Q days before 

 the town had any relief from it: insomuch that before it came, the people 

 were in thoughts of removing into the country, concluding it had been sunk, 

 as Port- Royal was. The mountains along the river are so thrown on heaps, 

 that all people are forced to go by Guanaboa to Sixteen-Mile-Walk. 



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