ALLUVIAL DIVISION. 
35 
We learn that the body of a person was found, name unknown, who was probably employed in the 
brick kiln or stables; which makes in all five dead bodies taken from the ruins last night. There are 
probably others buried among the ruins, as it is likely some persons at the time were in the stables or 
brick kiln. 
The avalanche passed over a public highway which leads to the mill and nail factory, and might have 
carried along with it some straggling traveller. The clay is piled up in masses to the depth of from ten 
to forty feet over a large surface. It must have moved with great rapidity, and it is fortunate that it had 
not happened at the time when the laborers were employed in digging from the hill. At the time it was 
snowing freely, and this morning the scene was entirely covered with a white veil. 
The scene that presented itself in the early part of the evening was awful in the highest degree. The 
horrors of an earthquake could not have presented a more dreadful spectacle. In the midst of a mass of 
convulsed earth, a multitude of human beings were moving to and fro; some carrying torches, and 
others digging among the ruins, and dragging from the midst the remains of some lifeless body, or were 
rescuing someone in whom life had not yet become extinct; some were crying “ho! ropes, ropes!” 
“ help,” “ shovels,” &c.; while the scene was dimly illuminated by the flames from the burning brick 
kiln, which is yet smouldering like an almost exhausted volcano. The scene must have been witnessed 
to be realized; we can give but a faint description of it. 
Five large trees were precipitated from the hill, some of which are now standing erect at the bottom, 
and others in a slightly inclined posture.* 
Land slip at Champlain, Lower Ca7iada —On the 28th of August, at 3 o’clock, p. m., the inhabitants 
of the village of Hayolle, in the parish of Champlain, L. C. were alarmed by a tract of land, containing 
a superficies of two hundred and seven arpents, or acres, suddenly sliding three hundred and sixty yards, 
and precipitating itself into the Champlain river, which it dammed up for one thousand and three hun¬ 
dred yards. In its progress, houses, bariis, trees, and whatever lay in its course, were overwhelmed. 
The catastrophe was accompanied by an appalling sound, and a dense vapor which filled the atmo¬ 
sphere, oppressing those who witnessed this phenomenon almost to suffocation. A man who was on the 
ground at the time, was removed with it to a considerable distance, and buried to the neck, but was extri¬ 
cated from his perilous situation without having sustained serious injury, f 
Frost expands water in freezing, and causes the earth and rocks to crack, often bursting 
off huge masses from the mountain sides. If the sides of mountains be very steep and com¬ 
posed of loose materials over rocky but not very uneven surfaces, masses of matter falling 
upon them will sometimes communicate sufficient momentum to cause slides, which may be 
narrow at their commencement, but go on widening, until vast masses of materials rush 
onward, bearing along, overturning and burying up every thing in their course. 
Land slips frequently block up rivers and streams in valleys, so as to cause lakes; and 
these sometimes bursting their boundaries, produce the most devastating effects. 
A small land slide occurred near Claverack in Columbia county, a few years since, on the 
banks of Claverack creek, on the road from Hudson to that village, and about a quarter of a 
Troy Budget, January 2, 1837. 
t Boston Journal of Science, VoL 1, p. 301. 
