CJtNTItLS OF VOLCANIC ACTIOS. 449 
tho Arkansas river, and the Ohio. The oscillations were 
more feeble on the east of the Alleghanies, than to the west 
ot these mountains, in Tennessee and Kentucky. Thev 
v ere accompanied by a great subterranean noise, proceeding 
from the south-west. In some places between New Madrid 
and Little Prairie, as at the Saline, north of Cincinnati, in 
latitude 37 3 45', shocks were felt every day, nay almost 
every hour, during several months. The whole of these 
phenomena continued from the 16th of December 1811, till 
the year 1813. The commotion, confined at first to’ the 
south, in the valley of the lower Mississippi, appeared to 
advance slowly northward. 
Precisely at the period when this long series of earthquakes 
commenced in the Transalleghanian States (in the month of 
December 1811), the town of Caracas felt the first shock in 
calm and serene weather. This coincidence of phenomena 
was probably not accidental ; for it must be borne in mind 
that, notwithstanding the distance which separates these 
countries, the low grounds of Louisiana and the coasts of 
V enezuela and Gumana belong to the same basin, that of 
the Gulf of Mexico. When we consider geologically tho 
basin of the Caribbean Sea, and of the Gulf of Mexico, 
we find it bounded on the south bv the coast-chain of 
Venezuela and the Cordilleras of Merida and Pamplona; 
on the east by the mountains of the West India Islands’ 
and the Alleghanies ; on the west by the Andes of Mexico! 
and the Kocky Mountains ; and on the north by the very 
inconsiderable elevations which separate the Canadian lakes 
from the rivers which flow into the Mississippi. More than 
two-thirds of this basin are covered with water. It is 
bordered by two ranges of active volcanos; on the east, in 
the Carribee Islands, between latitudes 13° and 16°; and’ on 
the west in the Cordilleras of Nicaragua, Guatim’ala, and 
Mexico, between latitudes 11° and 20°. When we reflect 
that the great earthquake at Lisbon, of the 1st of Novem- 
ber, 1755, was felt almost simultaneously on the coasts of 
bweden, at lake Ontario, and at the island of Martinique, it 
may not seem unreasonable to suppose, that all this basin of 
the West Indies, from Cumana and Caracas as far as tho 
plains of Louisiana, should be simultaneously agitated by 
commotions proceeding from the same centre of action. ‘ 
vol. i. a a 
