250 



CELEBES. 



[COAP. XVII, 



(Eanhquake ! earthquake!) Everybody msbed out of their 

 houses — women screamed and children cried— and 1 

 thought it prudent to go out too, On getting up, I found 

 my head giddy aiid my steps unsteady, and could hardly 

 walk without falling. The shook continued about a minute, 

 during wliich time I felt if I had been turmnl round 

 jind rountl, and wiis almost sea-sick. Going into the hou.so 

 again. 1 found a lamp and a bottle of arrack upset. Tliu 

 tumbler which fornieil the lamp had been thrown out nf 

 the saucer in which it had stood. The shock appeared to 

 be nearly vertical, rapid, vibratoiy, and Jerking. It waj* 

 sufficient, I have no doubt, to have thrown down brick 

 chimneys and walls and church towers; but as the houses 

 liere are all low, and strongly framed of timber, it is impfjs- 

 sible for them to be much injm'cd, except by a shock that 

 would utterly destroy a European city. The people told me 

 it was ten years since they had had a stronger shock than 

 this, at which time many houses were thrown dowB and 

 some people killed. 



At intervals of ten minutes to half an hour, slight 

 shocks and trcmoi-s were felt, sometimes strong enough to 

 send us all out again. There waib a strange mixture of 

 the terrible and the ludicrous in our situation. We might 

 ut any moment have a much stronger shock, which would 

 bring down the house over us, or — what 1 feared more — 

 cause a landslip, and send us down into the deep ravine 

 on the very edge of which the %'illage is built; yet 1 

 could not help laughing each time we mu out at a slight 

 shock, and then in a few moments ran in again. The 

 sublime and the ridiculous were here literally but a sU.^\> 

 apart On the one hand, the most terrible and destructive 

 of natural phenomena was in action around us — the rocks, 

 the mountains, the solid earth were trembling and con- 

 vulsed, and we were utterly impotent to guard against the 

 danger that might at any moment overwhelm us. On the 

 other hand was the spectacle of a number of men, women, 

 and children running in and out of their houses, on what 

 each time proved a vevy unnecessary alarm, as each shock 

 ceased just as it became strong enough to frighten us. It 

 seemed really very nmch like " playmg at earthquakes/' 

 and made many of the people join me in a hearty laugh, 



