1835.] RAIN AND EARTHQUAKES. 351 
Copiapé was in a rapid state of decay; but now it is in a very 
thriving condition ; and the town, which was completely over- 
thrown by an earthquake, has been rebuilt. 
The valley of Copiapé, forming a mere ribbon of green in a 
desert, runs in a very southerly direction; so that it is of consi- 
derable length to its source in the Cordillera. The valleys of Guas- 
co and Copiapé may both be considered as long narrow islands, 
separated from the rest of Chile by deserts of rock instead of by 
salt water. Northward of these, there is one other very miserable 
valley, called Paposo, which contains about two hundred souls ; 
and then there extends the real desert of Atacama—a barrier 
far worse than the most turbulent ocean. After staying a few 
days at Potrero Seco, I proceeded up the valley to the house of 
Don Benito Cruz, to whom I had a letter of introduction. I 
found him most hospitable; indeed it is impossible to bear too 
strong testimony to the kindness, with which travellers are re- 
ceived in almost every part of South America. The next day I 
hired some mules to take me by the ravine of Jolquera into the 
central Cordillera. On the second night the weather seemed to 
foretel a storm of snow or rain, and whilst lying in our beds we 
felt a trifling shock of an earthquake. 
The connexion between earthquakes and the weather has been 
often disputed: it appears to me to be a point of great interest, 
which is little understood. Humboldt has remarked in one part 
of the Personal Narrative,* that it would be difficult for any 
person who had long resided in New Andalusia, or in Lower 
Peru, to deny that there exists some connexion between these 
phenomena: in another part, however, he seems to think the 
connexion fanciful. At Guayaquil, it is said that a heavy shower 
in the dry season is invariably followed by an earthquake. In 
Northern Chile, from the extreme infrequency of rain, or even 
of weather foreboding rain, the probability of accidental coin- 
cidences becomes very small; yet the inhabitants are here most 
firmly convinced of some connexion between the state of the 
* Vol. iv. p. 11, and vol. ii. p. 217. For the remarks on Guayaquil see 
Silliman’s Journ. vol. xxiv. p. 384. For those on Tacna by Mr. Hamilton, 
see T'rans. of British Association, 1840. For those on Coseguina see Mr. 
Caldcleugh in Phil. Trans., 1855. In the former edition, I collected several 
-references on the coincidences between sudden falls in the barometer and 
earthquakes ; and between earthquakes and meteors. 
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