AN EARTHQUAKE. 



383 



words temblor !" temblor an earthquake !" 



an earthquake !" all rushed for the doors. I sprang 

 from my chair, made one bound across the room^ and 

 cleared the piazza. The earth rolled like the pitching 

 of a ship in a heavy sea. My step was high, my feet 

 barely touched the ground, and my arms were thrown 

 up involuntarily to save myself from falling. I was the 

 last to start, but, once under way, I was the last to stop. 

 Half way across the yard I stumbled over a man on his 

 knees, and fell. I never felt myself so feeble a thing 

 before. At this moment I heard Don Juan calling to 

 me. He was leaning on the shoulder of his servant, 

 with his face to the door, crying to me to come out of 

 the house. It was pitchy dark ; within was the table at 

 which we had sat, with a single candle, the light of 

 which extended far enough to show a few of the kneel- 

 ing figures, with their faces to the door. We looked 

 anxiously in, and waited for the shock which should 

 prostrate the strong walls and lay the roof on the ground. 

 There was something awful in our position, with our 

 faces to the door, shunning the place which at all other 

 times offers shelter to man. The shocks were contin- 

 ued perhaps two minutes, during which time it required 

 an effort to stand firm. The return of the earth to 

 steadiness was almost as violent as the shock. We 

 waited a few minutes after the last vibration, when Don 

 Juan said it was over, and, assisted by his servant, en- 

 tered the house. I had been the last to leave it, but I 

 was the last to return ; and my chair lymg with its back 

 on the floor, gave an intimation of the haste with which 

 I had decamped. The houses in Costa Rica are the 

 best in the country for resisting these shocks, being, 

 like the others, long and low, and built of adobes, or 

 undried bricks, two feet long and one broad, made of 



