242 
ON THE RECENT RIVIERA EARTHQUAKE. 
The railway was obstructed by rocks that were thrown 
down by the earthquake, and by damage to the tunnels; 
and the traffic between Mentone and Cannes was stopped 
for a day by a landslip. The earthquake was also felt 
slightly at Turin, Parma, Leghorn, and Marseilles ; there 
was also some indication of it in Austria and in 
France, and as far north as Cologne. In Mentone, 
which was in the district that suffered most, a large 
number of houses were so much shaken as to become 
dangerous, and required partly pulling down. The smaller 
town of Diano Marina was nearly destroyed, many of the 
inhabitants killed, and a large number injured; the great 
amount of personal injury in this case was attributed to the 
circumstance of the houses being mostly built over large 
vaults, in which casks of olive oil were stored, and in the 
earthquake the people were precipitated into these vaults 
with the ruins of the houses. The towns of the Riviera 
generally are marked by being built with a special provision 
against the effects of earthquakes, in arched buttresses 
extending across the narrow streets at various levels, to 
support the walls of their somewhat high-built stone houses. 
Taggia was another place that was nearly destroyed by the 
earthquake, and at Oneglia the houses generally were so 
much shaken as to be in danger of falling. In many towns 
the people had been caught in the act of escaping from their 
houses, and became buried in the ruins; and the danger of the 
remaining walls falling was so great as to make the rescue 
of those buried a very difficult work. This difficulty was 
terribly aggravated by a recurrence of the earthquake shocks 
several times, which, though weaker in intensity, were 
sufficient to bring down more of the already damaged walls. 
The occupants of the damaged hotels rushed out of doors 
on the first shock, and mostly remained camped out in the 
open air during the next night, some in arm-chairs, some on 
benches, some in tents, some on tables, and some in waggons, 
carriages and hotel omnibuses, and in bathing machines. The 
first shock occurred early in the morning, a little before six 
o’clock, when all were in bed, and the visitors rushed down 
instantly and out of doors, with very little clothing in many 
cases, and only able to obtain a further supply afterwards by 
getting clothes thrown out to them from the windows of their 
hotels. 
The following graphic account has been received from 
one of my friends, whose party was at Mentone, sleeping at 
the top of one of the large hotels. They were awaked by a 
horrible crash, and walls and roof seemed cracking in with a 
