f)08 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANS ACTIO.VS. [aNNO 1733. 



like-.vise happened, that when there was but a very slight trembhng at Foggia, 

 the pendukm) moved slowly at Ascoli, but stood still at Giovenazzo. 



In almost all the shocks this year, it was constantly observed, that a crashing 

 in the air and a horrid noise preceded them. Pliny, lib. 2, p. 80, also observes, 

 that sometimes terrible sounds, bellowings, and shouts like human, ushered in 

 earthquakes. This crashing in the air was diffused in a contrary direction : for, 

 whereas the parts of the earth were shook by a motion from the centri> to the 

 circumference ; so on the contrary, the motion of the air plainly converged 

 from the circumference to the centre; which phenomenon may have yielded no 

 small matter of speculation to naturalists. The Doctor would observe that this 

 is different from what Aristotle thought was the case with meteors, namely that 

 an external wind must contribute to an earthquake, as according to him the 

 coast of Achaia was shook by the conflict of a north and south wind. 



Lastly, it is worth observing in this earthquake, that near a country farm of 

 Carthusians, called Tre Santi, whose house had by the earthquake been levelled 

 with the ground since the 1st of March, in that spot where the channel of the 

 Fontana del Pesce is most depressed, there broke out in a plentiful stream a new 

 spring of muddy hot water. This indeed, is no new thing, nor was it unknown 

 to the ancients : since we find from their accounts, that waters burst out when 

 the body of the earth opens, in the same manner as water enters through the 

 seams of a ship ; nay, they give an account not only of small streams, but de- 

 luges of water that drowned whole cities ; which may seem more probable 

 to those who hold with Thales, according to Seneca, that the earth, sup- 

 ported by the waters, sometimes floats like a ship : but these things will seem 

 absurd to such as know the true structure of the terraqueous globe. The water 

 that burst out in Apulia began to dry up gradually, and in a month's time it 

 quite disappeared ; but the dry sand, even for some time, retained a sulphure- 

 ous smell. Thus Pliny, lib. 31, 4, affirms, that earthquakes pour out and 

 drink up waters : so that it is not surprising, that wo have accounts of lakes, 

 fountains, or rivers breaking out, where there were none before, and of others 

 being dried up. It was universally reported, that shallow wells, at the time of 

 the first earthquake, threw out their waters from their wide mouths : yet it is 

 not at all credible, that from the greatest shock water should burst out, but 

 that probably new water springing up in the bottom of these wells, as in other 

 places, and filling their cavities, it was thrown out. 



The water which had burst out near Tre Santi, when examined, exhibited 

 the following phajnomena. 



1. Bulk for bulk by the areometer it weighed 82 grains more than rain water; 



