252 Account of a Hurricane at Shelbyville, Tenn. 



prevent combustion. If the mortar should be kept at a red heat for 

 some length of time, the wood beneath it would be charred, but 

 could hardly be burnt. In case of fusion the zinc might be repla- 

 ced without injury to the mortar. I know of no construction for a 

 roof that would be more completely fire proof than this. 



Such are ray views on the subject to which you called my atten- 

 tion. If they shall serve, in any measure, to remove prejudice, and 

 allay unfounded apprehensions on a subject of great and growing 

 importance to the public, it will afford me much pleasure. 

 Brown University, October 1, 1836. 



Art. VI. — An account of a Hurricane, which visited Shelbyville, 

 Tennemee, June 1st, 1830; communicated to the Connecticut 

 Academy, by Dr. J. H. Kain. ^ 



Few occurrences give us such awful conceptions of the power of 

 the unrestrained elements, as the agitations of our atmosphere. 

 Accounts of storms at sea are common, and to those who make the 

 great waters their home, they are every day occurrences. But, 

 happily for the human family, such hurricanes as that which visited 

 Shelbyville in 1830, are rare. The ocean is easily agitated and 

 thrown into violent commotion ; but it requires a much more power- 

 ful wind to disturb the repose of those solid bodies which the earth's 

 gravity has bound to her bosom. The effects of a storm at sea are 

 much less dreadful and terrific than the devastations of a land hurri- 

 cane. A fine ship may safely weather the most violent gale at sea; 

 but probably no building or work of man could encounter, without 

 instant destruction, the fury of the hurricane wheji it meets with the 

 unyielding resistance of the solid land. Not only are massy build- 

 ings torn to pieces and scattered about in astonishing confusion ; but 

 the largest trees are twisted off at the trunk and hurled aloft like 

 pieces of paper in an ordinary breeze. 



Some countries appear to be more subject to tornadoes than oth- 

 ers. This is a well known feature of the climate of the West India 

 Islands. Numerous vestiges of hurricanes are seen in Tennessee. 

 In some places you may trace for thirty miles the track of a tornado, 

 which has prostrated the forest in its course, and piled up its ruins in 

 large masses ; sometimes they appear quite recent, and nature has 

 not repaired the waste ; the splintered stump is still standing, the 



