VOL. LXXIII."] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 381 



of my journey, of any volcanic matter having issued from the fissures of the 

 earth ; and I am convinced, that the whole damage has been done by exhala- 

 tions and vapours only. I was assured here, where they have had such a long 

 experience of earthquakes, that all animals and birds are in a greater or less 

 degree much more sensible of an approaching shock of an earthquake than any 

 human being ; but that geese, above all, seem to be the soonest and most 

 alarmed at the approach of a shock : if in the water, they quit it immediately, 

 and there is no driving them into the water for some time after. The port of 

 Messina and the town, in its half ruined state, by moon-light was strikingly 

 picturesque. Certain it is, that the force of the earthquake, though very vio- 

 lent, was nothing at Messina and Reggio, to what it was in the plain. 

 I visited the town of Messina the next morning, and found that all the 

 beautiful front of what is called the Palazatta, which extended in very lofty 

 uniform buildings, in the shape of a crescent, had been in some parts totally 

 ruined, in others less ; and that there were cracks in the earth of the quay, a 

 part of which had sunk above a foot below the level of the sea. These cracks 

 were probably occasioned by the horizontal motion of the earth in the same 

 manner as the pieces of the plain were detached into the ravines at Oppido and 

 Terra Nuova ; for the sea at the edge of the quay is so very deep, that the largest 

 ships can lie along-side ; consequently the earth, in its violent commotion want- 

 ing support on the side next the sea, began to crack and separate, and as where 

 there is one crack there are generally others less considerable in parallel lines to 

 the first, I suppose the great damage done to the houses nearest the quay has 

 been owing to such cracks under their foundations. 



The mortality at Messina does not exceed 700 out of upwards of 30,000, the 

 supposed population of this city at the time of the first earthquake. The gene- 

 rality of the inhabitants are in tents and barracks, which, having been placed in 

 3 or 4 different quarters, in fields and open spots near the town, but at a great 

 distance from each other, must be very inconvenient for a mercantile town ; and 

 unless great care is taken to keep the streets of the barracks, and the barracks 

 themselves, clean, I fear that the unfortunate Messina will be doomed to suffer 

 a fresh calamity from epidemical disorders, during the heat of summer. Indeed, 

 many parts of the plain of Calabria seem to be in the same alarming situation, 

 particularly owing to the lakes, which are forming from the course of rivers 

 having been stopped, some of which were already green, and tending to putre- 

 faction. Out of the cracks on the quay, it is said, that during the earthquakes 

 fire had been seen to issue ; but there are no visible signs of it, and I am per- 

 suaded it was no more than, as in Calabria, a vapour charged with electrical fire, 

 or a kind of inflammable air. A curious circumstance happened here also, to 

 prove that animals can remain long alive without food. Two mules belonging to 

 the duke of Belviso remained under a heap of ruins, one of them 11, and the 



