498 Scientific Proceedings, Royal Dublin Society. 
A.D. 1871, November 29. Stanley, Falkland Isles, off Cape Horn. 
—‘“ Just after midnight one of the inhabitants was awakened to 
find that his house was surrounded by a black moving mass of 
peat, several feet in height, and travelling down the hill at about 
four or five miles an hour: following up the course which the slip 
had taken, the hill presented a curious appearance ; from the peat- 
bank down to the brow of the hill, a distance of about 250 yards, 
the surface peat lay in confused heaps, direct from the opening of 
the bog. The water, or liquid peat, travelled over the ground 
faster than the heavier bodies, which were left standing 3 or 4 feet 
above the level of the ground. Proceeding to the top of the bog, 
I found a depression extending over 9 to 10 acres of ground, the 
edges cracking and filling up with water.” . . . An endeavour 
to drain the bog by cutting a trench did not succeed, ‘‘ owing to 
the soft peat welling up from the bottom and filling the trench 
again.” 
A.D. 1886, June 2. Stanley, Falkland Isles.—A second outbreak 
of the same bog took place 200 yards westward of the scene of the 
previous slip. A stream of half liquid peat, over 100 yards in 
width, and four or five deep, flowed suddenly through the town 
into the harbour, blocking up the streets, wrecking one or two 
houses in its path, and surrounding others, so as to imprison their 
inhabitants. One child was unfortunately smothered in the peat, 
and an old man is reported to be missing. ‘The slip is assigned to 
the unusually heavy rains which fell during the few previous 
days, and which the drains constructed by Mr. Bayley in 1878 
proved insufficient to carry off. * 
On comparing these records with each other, and with the 
account already given of the recent catastrophe, a close general 
similarity will readily be perceived to characterize them. 
The recorded outflows differ partly in magnitude, but chiefly 
in the rapidity of flow of the escaping material. The rate of flow 
1 Extracts from a letter by Acting Governor Bailey to Governor Callaghan. 
Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, vol. xxxv., Proceedings, pp. 96, 97, 
1879. 
2 Extracted from a letter by Lieut. Governor of the Falkland Islands, Arthur 
Barkly, to the Rt. Hon. Earl Granville. Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, 
vol. xliii., Proceedings, p. 2, 1887. 
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