9 
452 VOYAGE OF THE POTOMAC. [December, 
two leagues distant; and which happened on the night of the 
first earthquake, as will be seen in the sequel. 
On the first night of the earthquake, a woman with a child, only 
a few months old, was left buried beneath the ruins of an edifice, 
where she remained in security ; and, four days afterward, was 
taken out free from injury, and her child living. The latter had 
derived subsistence from the breast of its mother, whose exist- 
ence was thus preserved, as Eusebio prefers to call it, by a 
" miracle." 
On the thirtieth, new afflictions threatened the city from the 
odour of the unburied dead, of whom, at this time, there were 
probably more than thirteen hundred lying mangled and moulder-* 
ing amid the ruins, and impregnating the air with worse than 
pestilence ! As companions in these charnel-houses of the dead, 
might be found horses, and mules, and dogs — all kinds of domestic 
animals, which had experienced the fate of their owners, and con- 
tributed greatly to fill the air with the most offensive exhalations ! 
Added to these were a multitude of men, and women, and chil- 
dren, thrown into the streets, and squares, and gardens — some 
without arms — others without legs, and severely wounded — oth- 
ers beyond the reach of aid, finishing their lives in fruitless lamen- 
tations, and feeling the only cure for their sufi^erings to be in 
death ! 
Prostrated as was the city by these unparalleled suff'erings, it 
was doomed still farther to endure a partial famine, through the 
destruction of edifices, of mills, and ovens, and every building 
connected with the manufacture of bread ; while provisions of all 
kinds were buried in the general ruins. People of all classes 
were doomed to suffer from hunger, before repairs could be made 
and their wants supplied ! 
Eusebio dwells, in terms of the severest reprehension, on the 
conduct of those who could practise extortions on the wants and 
necessities of their fellow-citizens at such a time ! when gold, 
and silver, and pearls, and precious stones, were given to these 
infamous usurers for food for a few days, which in other times 
would have procured abundance for more than a year ! 
Thus terminated October, that month so unfortunate to the 
inhabitants of Lima. November presented, on the first night, the 
heavens bespangled with stars, which had been obscured for some 
