Lo a es 
Mineralogy and Geology. : oS 
In a few minutes, though, the panic was over again, and one heard 
even apne and joking at the sudden consternation and flight from 
the house. These ~— phenomena occur too often to rouse more 
than a passing anxiety, even when the shocks are of unusual — 
They seem to be content if their dwellings do not sink at once. Still, 
the inmates of the houses brought their beds into the open air, and 
opened the doors of their —_— My next neighbor, a young doctor, 
remarked, that probably no other severe shock would occur that night ; 
to which a Catholic priest replied, that the a was old, the roof’ rot- 
ten, and caution was at all events commenda e ‘people of the 
‘house went in again, and ake open doors DA, to their Easter feast, 
the conversation for the next hour turning almost exclusively upon the 
horrible ‘ temblos 
In the mean time, I, being sleepless, was looking _ upon the night- - 
ly sky. The day had, as usual, been very warm; the thermometer 
rising at noon to 88° Fahrenheit. Heaps of cloud ‘eaen stratus) 
were piled up mountain-like about = declining moon, but at about 10 
clock disappeared. The moon was now shining merrily through a 
clear and calm atmosphere, a rates aesninn veils of cloud (cirrus or 
cirro-cumulus) only, still hung immovable about some points of the ho- 
rizon. pene — in the atmosphere to announce any uncom- 
mon phenome 
Half an ae later; (103 Pp. m.) came the frighful shock _— laid 
San Salvador in ruins. It began with a loud noise and undu ing mo- 
tion, the ground moving as if shaken by a ie ipa sea. is mo- 
tion, with its accompanying subterranean thunder, in the same direction 
with the previous shocks, lasted some ten or twelve seconds. The 
py oa g and falling of roofs made a roar through which the appalling 
ounds below could scarcely be heard. A colossal cloud of dust arose. 
The terror, the cries and lamentations of the aan were beyond de- 
scription. Then followed prayers s and a universal, loud, wailing invo- 
‘on to Maria Sanctissima and all the saints, and Snail a low, 
lamenting, and supplicating song from thousands of voices rising simul- 
neo ly Jeabe all the places of refuge to which the multitude had fled 
she 
agencies, with adversaries of flesh and blood, and not, as now, with un- 
n powers of the depths of whose existence we hardl ware 
The shocks continued, sometimes light and sometimes with fearful 
force, with but short intervals, throughout the night and the next day, 
at the evening of which their number amounted to 120. I can com- 
Pare the awful rumbling noise attending them only to heavy cciaageae 
of artillery in some subterranean battle. metimes the noise was 
— of a rattling character, and the round me for minutes a 
teal shock. No one thought of goods and chattels; the people trem- 
bled still for their lives; the motion of the ground had opened it in all 
directions, and no one knew but that the next moment a yawning chasm 
Would open beneath his feet and swallow him for ever. After each 
Szconp aoe Vol, XVIII, No. 53.—Sept,, 1854. 36 
