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mass; ladies half dressed, and some without shoes; all these, whom their mutual dangers had here 
assembled to a place of safety, were on their knees at prayers, with the terrors of death in their coun¬ 
tenances, every one striking his breast, and crying out incessantly, Miserecordia men Dios. 
In the midst of our devotions, the second great shock came on, little less violent than the first, 
and completed the ruin of those buildings which had been already much shattered* The consternation 
now became so universal, that the shrieks and cries of Miserecordia could be distinctlv heard from the 
* 
top of St. Catherine’s hill, at a considerable distance off, whither a vast number of people had likewise 
retreated; at the same time we could hear the fall of the parish church there, whereby many persons 
were killed on the spot, and others mortally wounded. You may judge of the force of this shock, 
when I inform you, it was so violent, that I could scarce keep on my knees, but it was attended with 
some circumstances still more dreadful than the former.—On a sudden I heard a general outcry, ‘ The 
sea is coming in, we shall be all lost.’—Upon this, turning my eyes towards the river, which in that 
place is near four miles broad, I could perceive it heaving and swelling in a most unaccountable man¬ 
ner, as no wind was stirring; in an instant there appeared, at some small distance, a large body of 
water, rising like a mountain; it came on foaming and roaring, and rushed towards the shore with 
such impetuosity, that we all immediately ran for our lives, as fast as possible; many were actually 
swept away, and the rest above their waist in water at a good distance from the banks. For my own 
part, I had the narrowest escape, and should certainly have been lost, had I not grasped a large beam 
that lay on the ground, till the water returned to its channel, which it did almost at the same instant, 
with equal rapidity. As there now appeared at least as much danger from the sea as the land, and i 
scarce knew wdiither to retire from shelter, I took a sudden resolution of returning back with my 
clothes all dropping, to the area of St. Paul’s: here I stood some time, and observed the ships tumbling 
and tossing about, as in a violent storm; some had broken their cables, and were carried to the other 
side of the Tagus; others were whirled round with incredible swiftness; several large boats were 
turned keel upwards; and all this without any wind, which seemed the more astonishing. It was at 
the time of which I am now speaking, that the fine new quay, built entirely of rough marble, at an 
immense expence, was entirely swallowed up, with all the people on it, who had fled thither for 
safety, and had reason to think themselves out of danger in such a place; at the same time a great 
number of boats and small vessels, anchored near it (all likewise full of people, who had retired thither 
for the same purpose) wrnre all swallowed up, as in a whirlpool, and never more appeared. 
This last dreadful incident I did not see with my own eyes, as it passed three or four stones throws 
from the spot where I then was, but I. had the account as here given from several masters of ships, 
who were anchored within two or three hundred yards of the quay, and saw the whole catastrophe. 
One of them in particular informed me, that when the second shock came on, he could perceive the 
whole city waving backwards and forwards, like the sea when the wind first begins to rise; that the 
agitation of the earth was so great even under the river, that it threw up his large anchor from the 
mooring, which swam, as he termed it, on the surface of the water; that immediately upon this extra¬ 
ordinary concussion, the river rose at once near twenty feet, and in a moment subsided; at which 
instant he saw the quay, with the whole concourse of people upon it, sink down, and at the same 
time every one of the boats and vessels that w’ere near it were drawn into the cavity, which he sup¬ 
poses instantly closed upon them, inasmuch as not the least sign of a wreck was ever seen afterwards. 
This account you may give full credit to, for as to the loss of the vessels, it is confirmed by every 
body; and with regard to the quay, I went myself a few days after, to convince myself of the truth, 
and could not find even the ruins of a place, where I had taken so many agreeable walks, as this was 
the common rendezvous of the factory in the cool of the evening. I found it all deep w'ater, and in 
some parts scarcely to be fathomed. 
This is the only place I could learn which was swallowed up in or about Lisbon, though I saw- 
many large cracks and fissures in different parts, and an odd phenomenon I must not omit, which was 
communicated to me by a friend who has a house and wine-cellars on the other side of the river, viz. 
that the dwelling-house being first terribly shaken, which made all the family run out, there presently 
fell down a vast high rock near it, that upon this the river rose and subsided in the manner already 
mentioned, and immediately a great number of small fissures appeared in several contiguous pieces of 
ground, whence there spouted like a jet d' eau a large quantity of fine white sand, to a prodigious 
height. 
I had not been long in the area of St. Paul’s, when I felt the third shock, which though somewhat 
2 H 
