380 1'HILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [ANN0 1783. 



in depth, so that the poor people that had been thrown with their houses into 

 the ravine from the top of it, and had escaped with broken boiw, were now in 

 danger of being drowned. Having walked over the ruins of Oppido, I de- 

 scended into the ravine, and examined carefully the whole of it. Here I saw 

 indeed the wonderful force of the earthquake, which has produced exactly the 

 same effects as in the ravine of Terra Nuova, but on a scale infinitely greater. 

 The enormous masses of the plain, detached from each side of the ravine, lie 

 sometimes in confused heaps, forming real mountains, and having stopped the 

 course of two rivers, great lakes are already formed, and, if not assisted by na- 

 ture or art, so as give the rivers their due course, must infallibly be the cause of 

 a general infection in the neighbourhood. Sometimes I met with a detached 

 piece of the surface of the plain, of many acres in extent, with the large oaks 

 and olive-trees, with lupins or corn under them, growing as well, and in as good 

 order at the bottom of the ravine, as their companions, from whom they were 

 separated, do on their native soil in the plain, at least 500 feet higher, and at 

 the distance of about three quarters of a mile. I met with whole vineyards in 

 the same order in the bottom, that had likewise taken the same journey. In 

 another part of the bottom of the ravine there is a mountain composed of the 

 clay soil, and which was probably a piece of the plain detached by an earthquake 

 at some former period; it is about 250 feet high, and about 400 feet diameter 

 at its basis : this mountain, as is well attested, has travelled down the ravine 

 near 4 miles, having been put in motion by the earthquake of the 5th of Feb. 

 The abundance of rain which fell at that time, the great weight of the fresh 

 detached pieces of the plain, which are heaped up at the back of it, the nature 

 of the soil of which it is composed, and particularly its situation on a declivity, 

 accounts well for this phenomenon. The Prince of Cariati showed me 2 girls, 

 one of about l6 years of age, who had remained 1 1 days without food under the 

 ruins of a house at Oppido : she had a child of 5 or 6 months old in her arms, 

 which died the 4 th day. The girl gave a clear account of her sufferings; having light 

 through a small opening, she had kept an exact account of the number of days 

 she had been buried. She did not seem to be in bad health, drank freely, but 

 had yet a difficulty in swallowing any thing solid. The other girl was about 1 1 

 years of age ; she remained under the ruins 6 days only ; but in so very confined 

 and distressful a posture, that one of her hands, pressing against her cheek, had 

 nearly worn a hole through it. 



Several fishermen assured me, that during the earthquake of the 5th of Feb. 

 at night, the sand near the sea was hot, and that they saw fire issue from the 

 earth in many parts. This circumstance has been often repeated to me in the plain ; 

 and my idea is, that the exhalations which issued during the violent commotions 

 of the earth were full of electrical fire, just as the smoke of volcanos is con- 

 stantly observed to be during violent eruptions; for I saw no mark, in any part 



