had been detached from the bottom of the plain above-mentioned. I observed also, that many confused heaps of the loose soil, detached by the earthquake from the plains on each side of the ravine, had actually run like volcanic lava (having probably been assisted by the heavy rain) and produced many effects much resembling those of lava, during their course down a great part of the ravine. At Santa Cristina, near Oppido, the like phenomena have been exhibit ed, and the great force of the earthquake of the 5th of February seems to have been exerted on these parts, and at Casal Nuova, and Terra Nuova. At Reggio the shock had been much less violent than in the places he had hitherto visited; and though there was not a house in it inhabited or habitable, yet' says he, 'after having been several days in the plain, where every building is levelled with the ground, a house with a roof, or a church with a steeple, was to me a new and refreshing object.' In this place he had an account from the archbishop of the earthquakes of 1779 and 1780, which obliged the inhabitants, in number 16,400, to remain in barracks for several months, without having done any considerable damage to the town. He was informed also, that all animals and birds are in a greater or less degree much more sensible of an approaching shock of an earthquake, than any human being; but that geese, above all, seem to be the soonest and most alarmed at the approach of a shock; if in the water, they quit it immediately; and will not be driven into it for some time after. The shock which damaged Reggio came on gently, so that the people had time to make their escape, and only 126 were killed; but in the plain this shock was as instantaneous as it was violent and destructive. On the 14th of May, Sir William Hamilton left Reggio, and set sail for Messina. He found that the shock, though very violent there, had been far inferior to what he had seen the effects of in other places. Many houses, even in the lower part of the town, were standing, and some little damaged; but, in the upper and more elevated situations, the earthquakes seemed to have scarce had any effect. A strong instance (says our author) of this is, that the convent of Santa Barbara, and that called the Novitiato de Gesniti, both on an elevated situation, have not a crack in them; and that the clock of the latter has not been deranged in the least by the earthquakes, which have afflicted this country for four months past, and which still continue in some degree. Notwithstanding this comparative mildness, the shock at Messina had been very terrible. All the beautiful front of the palazzate, which extended in very lofty uniform buildings, in the shape of a crescent, had been in some parts totally ruined, in others less; and there were cracks in the earth of the quay, a part of which had sunk above a foot below the level of the sea. During the earthquake, fire had been seen to issue from the cracks of the quay; but our author is persuaded that this was only a vapor charged with electrical fire, or inflammable air. Here also he was informed, that the shock of the 5th of February had been from the

bottom upwards; but the subsequent ones generally horizontal or vorticose. A remarkable circumstance was observed at Messina, and through the whole coast of Calabria, which had been most affected by the earthquake, viz. that a small fish called cicirelli, resembling the English white bait, but larger, and which usually lie at the bottom of the sea buried in the sand, had, ever after the commencement of the earthquakes to the time this account was written, continued to be taken near the surface, and that in such abundance as to be common food for the poorest of the people; whereas before the earthquakes this fish was rare, and reckoned among the greatest delicacies. Fish of all kinds also were taken in greater abundance on these coasts after the commencement of the earthquakes than before; which our author supposes to have been occasioned either by the volcanic matter having heated the bottom of the sea, or that the continual tremor of the earth had forced them out of their retreats. At Messina, Sir William was told that on the 5th of February, and for three days following, the sea, about a quarter of a mile from the citadel, rose, and boiled in an extraordinary manner, and with a most horrid and alarming noise; the water in other parts of the strait being perfectly calm. This,' says he, 'seems to point out exhalations or eruptions from cracks at the bottom of the sea, which may probably have happened during the violence of the earthquakes; all of which I am convinced have here a volcanic origin.'

In various parts of South America, earthquakes have been equally tremendous and fatal. It is remarkable that the city of Lima, the capital of Peru, situated in about 12° of S. lat, although scarcely ever visited by tempests, and equally unacquainted with rain as with thunder and lightning, has been singularly exposed to the fury of earthquakes, which happen here so frequently, that the inhabitants are under continual apprehensions of being, from their suddenness and violence, buried in the ruins of their own houses: yet these earthquakes, though so sudden, have their presages; one of the principal of which is a rumbling noise in the bowels of the earth, about a minute before the shocks are felt, that seems to pervade all the adjacent subterraneous part; this is followed by dismal howlings of the dogs, who seem to presage the approaching danger. The beasts of burden passing the streets stop, and by a natural instinct spread open their legs, the better to secure themselves from falling. On these portents, the terrified inhabitants fly from their houses into the streets with such precipitation, that, if it happens in the night, they appear quite naked; the urgency of the danger at once banishing all sense of delicacy or shame. Thus the streets exhibit such odd and singular figures as might afford matter of diversion, were it possible to be diverted in so terrible a moment. This sudden concourse is accompanied with the cries of children waked out of their sleep, blended with the lamentations of the women, whose agonising prayers to the saints increase the common fear and confusion. The men are also too much

affected to refrain from giving vent to their terror; so that the whole city exhibits a dreadful scene of consternation and horror.

The earthquakes that have occurred at the capital of Spanish America are very numerous. The first since the establishment of the Spaniards was in 1582; but the damage was much less considerable than in some of the succeeding. Six years after, Lima was again visited by another earthquake, so dreadful, that it is still solemnly commemorated every year. In 1609 there was a third, which overturned many houses. On the 27th of November, 1630, such prodigious damage was done in the city by an earthquake, that, in acknowledgment of its not having been entirely demolished, a festival on that day is annually celebrated. Twenty-four years afterwards, on the 3rd of November, the most stately edifices in the city, and a great number of houses, were destroyed by a similar attack; but the inhabitants retiring, few of them perished. Another dreadful percussion took place in 1678; but one of the most terrible was on the 28th of October, 1687. It began at four in the morning, and destroyed many of the finest public buildings and houses, in which a great number of the inhabitants perished; but this was little more than a prelude to what followed; for two hours afterwards the shock returned, with such impetuous concussions, that all was laid in ruins, and the inhabitants felt themselves happy in being only spectators of the general devastation by having saved their lives, though with the loss of all their property. During this second shock the sea, retiring considerably, and then returning in mountainous waves, entirely overwhelmed Callao, which is at five miles distance from Lima, and all the adjacent country, together with the miserable inhabiFrom this time six other earthquakes were felt at Lima previous to that of 1746, on the 28th of October, at half an hour after ten at night, when the concussions began with such violence, that, in little more than three minutes, the greatest part, if not all the buildings in the city, were destroyed, burying under their ruins those inhabitants who had not made sufficient haste into the streets and squares, the only places of safety. At length the horrible effects of the first shock ceased; but the tranquillity was of short duration, the concussions swiftly succeeding each other. The fort of Callao also sunk in ruins; but what it suffered from the earthquake in its building was inconsiderable, when compared to the dreadful catastrophe which followed; for the sea, as is usual on such occasions, receding to a considerable distance, returned in mountainous waves, foaming with the violence of the agitation, and suddenly buried Callao and the neighbouring country in its flood. This, however, was not entirely effected by the first swell of the waves; for the sea retiring further, returned with still greater impetuosity, and covered both the walls and other buildings of the place; so that what even had escaped the first inundation, was totally overwhelmed by those succeeding mountainous waves. Twenty-three ships and vessels, great and small, were then in the harbour, nineteen of

tants.

which were sunk, and the other four, among which was a frigate named St. Fermin, were carried by the force of the waves to a considerable distance up the country. This terrible inundation and earthquake extended to other parts on the coast, and several towns underwent the same fate as the city of Lima; where the number of persons who perished, within two days after it began, amounted, according to the bodies found, to 1300, beside the maimed and wounded, many of whom lived only a short time in great torture.

Various theories have been invented to explain the phenomena of earthquakes. Till lately, the hypotheses of modern philosophers were much the same with those of the ancients. Anaxagoras supposed the cause of earthquakes to be subterraneous clouds bursting out into lightning, which shook the vaults that contined them. Others imagined that the arches, which had been weakened by continual subterraneous fires, at length fell in. Others derived these double convulsions from the rarefied steam of waters heated by some neighbouring fires (an hypothesis revived in modern times by M. Dolomieu); whilst some, among whom was Epicurus, and several of the Peripatetics ascribed them to the ignition of certain inflammable exhalations. This last hypothesis has been adopted by many of the most celebrated moderns, as Gassendus, Kircher, Schottos, Varenius, Des Cartes, Du Hamel, Honorius, Fabri, &c. The philosopher last mentioned, indeed supposed, that waters prodigiously rarefied by heat, might sometimes occasion earthquakes. The others supposed, that there are many and vast cavities under ground, which have a communication with one another: some of which abound with waters; others with vapors and exhalations, arising from inflammable substances, as nitre, bitumen, sulphur, &c. These combustible exhalations they supposed to be kindled by a subterraneous spark, or by some active flame gliding through a narrow fissure from without, or by the fermentation of some mixture; and when this happens, that they may necessarily produce pulses, tremors, and ruptures at the surface, according to the number and diversity of the cavities, and the quantity and activity of the inflammable matter. This hypothesis they illustrated by a variety of experiments, such as mixtures of iron filings and brimstone buried in the earth, gun-powder confined in pits, &c., by all which a shaking of the earth will be produced. Dr. Woodward suggests another hypothesis. He supposes that the subterraneous heat or fire, which is continually elevating water out of the abyss, which, according to him, occu'pies the centre of the earth, to furnish rain, dew, springs, and rivers, may be stopped in some particular part. When this obstruction happens, the heat causes a great swelling and commotion in the waters of the abyss; and at the same time, making the like effort against the superincumbent earth, that agitation and concussion of it is occasioned which we call an earthquake. M. Amontons, supposing the atmosphere to be about forty-five miles high, and that the density of the air increases in proportion to the absolute height of the superincumbent column of fluid,

shows that, at the depth of 43,528 fathoms below the surface of the earth, air is but one-fourth lighter than mercury. Now this depth of 43,528 fathoms is only a seventy-fourth part of the semidiameter of the earth; and the vast sphere beyond this depth, in diameter 6,451,538 fathoms, may probably be only filled with air; which will be here greatly condensed, and much heavier than the heaviest bodies we know in nature. But it is found by experiment, that the more air is compressed, the more does the same degree of heat increase its spring, and the more capable does it render it of a violent effect; and that, for instance, the degree of heat of boiling water increases the spring of the air above what it has in its natural state, in our climate, by a quantity equal to a third of the weight wherewith it is pressed. Whence we may conclude, that a degree of heat, which on the surface of the earth will only have a moderate effect, may be capable of a very violent one below. And, as we are certain that there are in nature degrees of heat much greater than that of boiling water, it is possible there may be some whose violence, further increased by the immense weight of the air, may be sufficient to break and overturn this solid orb of 43,528 fathoms; whose weight, compared to that of the included air, would be but a trifle.

In March, 1749, an earthquake was felt at London and several other places in Britain. Dr. Stukely, who had been much engaged in electrical experiments, began to suspect that phenomena of this kind ought to be attributed not to vapors or fermentations generated in the bowels of the earth, but to electricity. In a paper published by him on this subject, he rejects all the above hypotheses for the following reasons:-1. That there is no evidence of any remarkable cavernous structure of the earth; but that, on the contrary, there is reason to presume that it is in a great measure solid, so as to leave little room for internal changes and fermentations within its substance; nor do coal-pits, when on fire, ever produce any thing resembling an earthquake. 2. In the earthquake at London, in March 1749, there was no such thing as fire, vapor, smoke, smell, or an eruption of any kind observed, though the shock affected a circuit of fifty miles in diameter. This consideration alone, of the extent of surface shaken by an earthquake, he thought sufficient to overthrow the supposition of its being owing to the expansion of any subterraneous vapors. For, as small fire-balls bursting in the air propagate a sulphureous smell to the distance of several miles, it cannot be supposed that so immense a force, acting instantaneously on that compass of ground, should never break the surface of it, nor become discoverable either to the sight or the smell; besides that such a fermentation would require a long time. That such an effect, therefore, should be produced instantaneously, can be accounted for by electricity only, which acknowledges no sensible transition of time, nor any bounds. 3. If vapors and subterraneous fermentations, explosions, and eruptions, were the cause of earthquakes, they would absolutely ruin the whole system of springs and fountains,

wherever they had once been; which is contrary to fact, even when they have been frequently repeated. In the earthquake in Asia Minor, A. D. 17, which destroyed thirteen great cities, and shook a mass of earth 300 miles in diameter, nothing suffered but the cities; neither the springs nor the face of the country being injured 4. That any subterraneous power, sufficient to move thirty miles in diameter, must be lodged at least fifteen or twenty miles below the surface; and therefore must move an inverted cone of solid earth, the base of which is thirty miles in diameter, and the axis fifteen or twenty; an effect impossible to any natural power whatever, except electricity. So in Asia Minor, such a cone must have been 300 miles in the diameter of the base, and 200 in the axis: which not all the gun-powder that has been made since the invention of it, much less any vapors generated so far below the surface, could possibly effect. 5. A subterraneous explosion will not account for the manner in which ships, far from land, and even fish, are affected during an earthquake. A subterraneous explosion would only produce a gradual swell, and not give so quick an impulse to the water as would make it feel like a stone. From these circumstances the Doctor concluded, that an earthquake was a shock of the same kind as those in electrical experiments. And this hypothesis was confirmed by the phenomena attending earthquakes, particularly those in 1749 and 1750, which gave rise to this publication. The weather, for five or six months before, had been uncommonly warm; the wind south and south-west, without rain; so that the earth must have been in a state peculiarly ready for an electrical shock. Before the earthquake at London, all vegetables had been uncommonly forward: and electricity is well known to quicken vegetation. The aurora borealis had been frequent about that time; and, just before the earthquake, had been twice repeated in such colors as had never been seen before. It had also removed souther'y, contrary to what is common in England; so that the Italians, and those among whom earthquakes were frequent, actually foretold the earthquake. The year had been remarkable for fire-balls, lightning, and coruscations; and these are meteors of an electrical nature. In such circumstances, nothing, he says, is wanting to produce an earthquake, but the presence of some non-electric body; which must be had ab extra from the atmosphere. Hence he infers, that if a non-electric cloud discharge its contents upon any part of the earth, in that highly electrical state, an earthquake must necessarily ensue. As the discharge from an excited tube produces a commotion in the human body, so the discharge of electric matter from many miles of solid earth must needs be an earthquake; and the snap from the contact, the horrid uncouth noise attending it. Dr. Stukely had been informed, that, a little before the earthquake, a large and black cloud suddenly covered the atmosphere, which probably occasioned the shock by the discharge of a shower. A sound was observed to roll from the Thames towards Temple-Bar before the houses ceased to nod, just as the electrical snap precedes the shock. This noise (which generally precedes

earthquakes) he thought could be accounted for only on electrical principles for, in a subterraneous eruption, the direct contrary would happen. The flames and sulphureous smells, which are sometimes observed in earthquakes, might, he thought, be more easily accounted for on the supposition of their being electrical phenomena, than from their being occasioned by eruptions from the bowels of the earth. So also the suddenness of the concussion, felt at the same instant over such a large surface, and the little damage also which earthquakes generally occasion, sufficiently point out what sort of motion it is; not a convulsion of the bowels of the earth, but a uniform vibration along its surface, like that of a musical string, or a glass, when rubbed on the edge with one's finger. The circumstance of earthquakes chiefly affecting the sea-coast, places along rivers, &c., is a further argument of their being electrical phenomena, This is illustrated by a particular account of the direction in which the earthquake was conveyed. The last argument he uses is taken from the effects which it had on persons of weak constitutions, who were, for a day or two after it happened, troubled with pains in the back, rheumatisms, hysterics, and nervous disorders; just in the same manner as they would have been after an actual electrification: to some, these disorders proved fatal. The same hypothesis was advanced by Signior Bec caria, without knowing any thing of Dr. Stukely's discoveries.

Dr. Priestley, in his History of Electricity, observes, upon these theories, that a more probable hypothesis may be formed out of them both. 'Suppose,' says he, the electric matter to be accumulated in one part of the surface of the earth, and on account of the dryness of the season not easily to diffuse itself; it may force its way into the higher regions of the air, forming clouds in its passage out of the vapors which float in the atmosphere, and occasion a sudden shower, which may further promote the passage of the fluid. The whole surface, thus unloaded, will receive a concussion, like any other conducting substance, on parting with, or receiving, a quantity of the electric fluid. The rushing noise will likewise sweep over the whole extent of the country. And upon this supposition also the fluid, in its discharge from the country, will naturally follow the course of the rivers, and also take the advantage of any eminences to facilitate its ascent into the higher regions of the air.' The Dr., making experiments with a battery on the passage of the electrical fluid over different conducting substances, and, among these, over water, and remarking a resemblance between its passage over the surface of the water, and that which Dr. Stukely supposed to sweep the surface of the earth, when a considerable quantity of it is discharged to the clouds during an earthquake, immediately suspected that the water over which it passed, and which was visibly thrown into a tremulous motion, must receive a concussion resembling that which is given to the waves of the sea on such occasions. To try this, he himself, and others present, put their hands into the water at the time that the electric flash passed over its surface; and they felt a sudden

concussion given to them, exactly like that which affects ships at sea during an earthquake. This percussion was felt in various parts of the water, but was strongest near the place where the explosion was made. "This similarity in the effect,' he says, 'is a considerable evidence of a similarity in the cause. Pleased with this resemblance of the earthquake, I endeavoured to imitate that great natural phenomenon in other respects: and, it being frosty weather, I took a plate of ice, and placed two sticks about three inches high on their ends, so that they would just stand with ease; and upon another part of the ice I placed a bottle, from the cork of which was suspended a brass ball with a fine thread. Then, making the electrical flash pass over the surface of the ice, which it did with a very loud report, the nearer pillar fell down, while the more remote stood; and the ball which had hung nearly still, immediately began to make vibrations about an inch in length, and nearly in a right line from the place of the flash. I afterwards diversified this apparatus, erecting more pillars, and suspending more pendulums, &c.; sometimes upon bladders stretched on the mouth of open vessels, and at other times on wet boards swimming in a vessel of water. This last method seemed to answer the best of any; for the board representing the earth, and the water the sea, the phenomena of them both during an earthquake may be imitated at the same time; pillars, &c., being erected on the board, and the electric flash being made to pass either over the board, over the water, or over them both.' The last three hypotheses, though somewhat differing, yet agree in the main; but, if a particular solution of the phenomena is required, every one of them will be found deficient: nor does the theory of this subject appear to have been sufficiently understood to be worth pursuing much further; we only therefore add that the late Dr. Mason Goode attempts to account for the phenomena of earthquakes by the old theory of subterraneous fires.

That fires to an enormous extent, and produced by various causes, may exist at different depths beneath the surface of the earth, must, he thinks, be clear to every one who has attentively considered the subject: and he quotes a curious series of experiments, lately conducted by Sir James Hall, to prove that where the substances in which such fires occur lie profound, and are surmounted by a very deep and heavy superincumbent pressure; and, more especially, where they, at the same time, contain large portions of elastic gases; the effects of such fires will be prodigiously greater, and more diversified, than where these circumstances are absent.

Earthquakes and volcanoes may be reckoned, for the most part, as this writer supposes, among the most powerful and extraordinary of these effects; and, as resulting from those chemical changes which the agency of fire principally produces in the interior of the solid crust of the globe. They have, probably, little further connexion with electricity, he says, than as causes that occasionally destroy the equilibrium; for although some authors have inferred, from the great velocity with which the shock of an earthquake is transmitted from place to place, that its

nature must be electrical; yet others have, with greater probability, attributed the rapid succession of the effects to the operation of a single cause, acting like subterranean heat, at a great distance below the earth's surface. There are, however, some circumstances which indicate such a connexion between the state of the atmosphere and the approach of an earthquake, as cannot easily be explained by any hypothesis. The shocks of earthquakes, and the eruptions of volcanoes, continues Dr. G., are in all probability modifications of the effects of one common cause; the same countries are liable to both of them; and, where the agitation produced by an earthquake extends farther than there is any reason to suspect a subterraneous commotion, it is probably propagated through the earth nearly in the same manner as a noise is conveyed through the air. See VOLCANO.

EARWAX. See ANATOMY.

EARWIG, in zoology. See FORFICULA.

EASDALE, a small island of the Hebrides, annexed to Argyleshire, about one mile and a half in diameter. It is famous for having afforded a great quantity of slate (ardesia tegularis). This, indeed, occupies the whole island, which is also traversed in many places with basaltic veins, and thin layers of quartzose and calcareous stones. EASE, n. s. & v. a. Sax. eath; Goth. azek; EASE'FUL, adj. Fr. aise; Ital. agio, which EASE LESS, adj. Menage derives from Lat. EASE-LOVING, otium, becoming ocium, EASE MENT, n. s. ogium, ogeo. Quiet; rest; EA'SY, adj. tranquillity; peace; reEA'SILY, adv. pose; freedom from pain, EA'SINESS, n. s. disturbance, labor, or engagement. The verb seems to be derived from the noun, and means to relieve, deliver, or rescue from trouble, disturbance, burden, or pain; or to alleviate, soothe, or assuage pain or trouble. Easeful and easy are peaceful; tranquil. Easeless, the opposite of this. Easement is relief; assistance; support; and in law, a service that one neighbour has of another by charter or prescription, without profit; as a way through his ground, a sink, &c.

I seye to you that to Sodom it schal be esier than to that cytee in that day. Wiclif. Luk. 10. I will ease me of mine adversaries. Isaiah i. 24. The chambers and the stablis werin wide, And well we werin esid at the best.

Chaucer.

Sounds move swiftly, and at great distance; but they require a medium well disposed, and their transmission is easily stopped. Id. Natural History.

We should not find her half so brave and bold To lead it to the wars and to the seas;

To make it suffer watchings, hunger, cold, When it might feed with plenty, rest with ease, Davies.

Send me some tokens that my hope may live, Or that my easeless thoughts may sleep and rest. Donne.

Believe me, friends, loud tumults are not laid With half the easiness that they are raised.

Lucan, content with praise, may lie at ease In costly grots and marble palaces. Id. Juvenal. Help and ease children the best you can; but by no means bemoan them. Loche.

No body feels pain that he wishes not to be eased of, with a desire equal to that pain, and inseparable Id. from it.

The safest way to secure honesty, is to lay the foundations of it early in liberality, and an easiness to part with to others whatever they have or like themselves.

Id.