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Show 430 EARTUQUAICE IN CALAlHUA, A.D. 1183. had persuaded a great part of his vassals to betake · themsel vee to their fishing-boats for safety, and he himself had gone on board. On the night of the 5th of February, when some of the people were sleeping in the boats, and others on a level 1;1lain slightly elevated above the sea, the earth rocked, and suddenly a great mass was torn from the contiguous Mount J aci, and thrown down with a dreadful crash upon the plain. Immediately afterwards, the sea rising thirty palms above the level of this low tract, rolled foaming over it, and swept away the multitude. It then retreated, but soon rushed back again with greater violence, bringing with it some of the people and animals it had carried away. At the same time every boat was sunk or dashed against the beach, and some of them were swept far inland. The aged Prince, with one thousand four hundred and thirty of his people, was destroyed. The number of persons who perished during the earthquake in the two Calabrias and Sicily is estimated by Hamilton at about forty thousand, and about twenty thousand more died by epidemics which were caused by insufficient nourishment, exposure to the atmosphere, and malaria, arising from the new stagnant lakes and pools. By far the greater number were buried under the ruins of their houses; while some were burnt to death in the conflagrations which almost invariably followed the shocks, and consumed immense magazines of oil and other provisions. A small number were engulphed in chasms and fissures, and their skeletons are perhaps buried in the earth to this day, at the depth of several hundred feet, for such was the profundity of some of the openings which did not close in again. The inhabitants of Pizzo remarked, that on the 5th of February, 1783, when the first great shock affiicted Calabria, the volcano of Stromboli, which is in full view of that town, and at the distance of about fifty miles, smoked less, and threw tlp a less quantity of inflamed matter, than it had done for some years previously. On the other hand, the great crater of Etna is said to have given out a considerable quantity of vapour towards the beginning, and Stromboli towards the dose of the commotions. But as no eruption happened from either of these great vents during the whole earthquake, the sources of the Calabrian convulsions, and of the volcanic fires of Etna and Stro~boli, appear to be very independent of each other; EXCAVATION OP VALLEYS. ?13) unless, indeed, they have th · and the volcanos of the Phi c same m~tual relation as Vesuvius disturbance in one d!'st . tegrrea.n Fwlds and Ischia, a violent nc servmg I! other, and both never bein()' in f 1 a~ .a Saiety-valve to the It is impossible for the o eolo u. ~ activity. at once. effect of t~is single earthqu!ke oft to consider attentively the the alteratwns in the physi'c 1 d?SS, and to look forward to . a con 1t1on of t1 . a contmued series of such m . . le country to which . l ovements Will her ft . . Wit 1out perceiving that th e JI!. ormatt• on of v 11 ea ebr gwe l'l.s e, water can never be underst d . f a. eys y runmng independently of the agencyoof ' 1 hwc ckonslder the question b . o eart qua es R. d egm to act, as some seem t o 1. mag.m e w.h e IVers o no. t already elevated far above th 1 1 f n a country Is it is rising or sinking by s e e.ve o the sea, but while C 1 b . . uccessiVe movements Wh h a a ria IS now undergoing an 'd · et er 1 . Y const erable ch f I . evel, m regard to the sea or I. 1 ange o re ahve · ' s, upon t 1e whole n 1 · ary., IS a question wht'ch our ob servatw. n ' efia r yd statwn4 entirely to the last half cent s, con ne almost determine But k uhry, cannot possibly enable us to h 11 • • . we now t at strata, containin . S e S Identical with those now }' • . h g speCieS of the Mediterranean, have been ~.:~:!dl~ t t~.contiguous parts of have in Sicily, to the height of sever~~ hls country, as they those geologists who merely grant that :housand feet. Now N~ture, in the inanimate world has b e present c?urse of existing species of animals were 'in . een ~nchanged smce the that the Calabrian streams d .bemg,hwtll not feel surprise . an rivers ave cut t f comparatively modern strata a ou o such in depth from fifty to six h d gr~a; system of valleys varying wide when they 'd hun re eet, and often several miles ' consi er ow numerou h earthquakes which lifted th s. must ave been the gious a height Some ost rece~t marme strata to so prodi~ analogy of exis.tin()' N t s~ec~ adtors, mde_ed, who disregard the o a ure, an who are as I' ·I f . ns they are thrifty of t · ' proc Iga o violence like an exhalation, fro Imei mday suppose that Calabria "rose Pandemonium B m ~ le eep, after the manner of Milton's that peculiar r~mov~ s~c an hypothesis will deprive them of of dee and wid g orce r~qm~ed to form a regular system Landsfips must eb:~{:~:.;Jor t~m~ IS ess:ntial to the operation. terraneau mov aw~y m the Intervals between sub. buttresses to th:mpe:s? ·~therwlil~ffie fallen ~asses will serve as cipl ous c s bordermg a valley, so that |