227 



sea was violently agitated even as far as the 

 New World, for instance, at the island of Barba- 



inches, the water rose twenty feet in Carlisle Bay. It be- 

 came at the same time "■ as black as ink because, without 

 doubt, it was mixed with the petroleum, or asphaltum, 

 which abounds at the bottom of the sea, as well on the coasts 

 of the gulf of Cariaco, as near the island of Trinidad. In 

 the West Indies, and in several lakes of Switzerland, this 

 extraordinary motion of the waters was observed six hours 

 after the first shock that was felt at Lisbon. (Phil. Trans., 

 voL xlix, p. 403, 410, 544, 688 \ ibid., vol. lii, p. 424.) At 

 Cadiz a mountain of water sixty feet high was seen eight 

 miles distant at sea j this mass threw itself impetuously on 

 the coasts, and beat down a great number of edifices ; like 

 the wave fourscore and four feet high, which, on the 9th of 

 June, 1586, at the time of the great earthquake at Lima, co- 

 vered the port of Callao. ( Acosta, Hist, natural de las Indias, 

 ed. de 1591, p. 123.) In North America, on Lake Ontario, 

 strong agitations of the water were observed, from the month 

 of October 1755. These phenomena are proofs of subterra- 

 neous communications at enormous distances. On compar- 

 ing the epochas of the great catastrophes of Lima and Gua- 

 timala, which generally succeed each other at long intervals, 

 it has sometimes been thought, that the effect of an action 

 slowly propagating itself along the Cordilleras, sometimes 

 from north to south, at other times from south to north, may 

 be perceived. (Cosme Bueno, Descripcion del Peru, ed. de 

 Lima, p. 67.) The following are four of these remarkable 

 epochas. 



Mexico. Peru. 

 (Lat. 13° 32' north.) (Lat. 12° 2' south.) 



30th of Nov. 1577. 17th of June, 1578. 



4th of March, 1679. 17th of June, 1678, 



12th of Feb. 1689. 10th of Oct. 1688. 



27th of Sept. 1717. 8lh of Feb. 1716. 



