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winds were N. and N. E. accompanied with various, though verysmall, tremors of the earth. The year 1755 proved very wet andrainv : the summer cooler than usual; and for 40 days before tlieeartliqiiake, the weather was clear, but not remarkably so. The31st of October, the sun was obscured, with a remarkable gloomi-ness in the atmosphere. On the 1st of Nov. early in the morn-ing, a thick fog arose, which was soon dissipated by the heat of thesun; no wind was stirring; the sea was calm; and the weatherwas as warm as in June or July in Britain. At 35 minutes after t),without the least warning, except a rumbling noise, like the artifi-cial thunder in our theatres, a most dreadful earthquake shook, hyquick but short vibrations, the foundations of all the city, so thatmany buildings instantly fell, '('hen, with a pause scarce percep-tible, the nature of the motion was changed, and the houses weretossed from side to side, with a 'motion like that of a waggon vio-lently driven over rough stones. This second shock laid almosttin; whole city in ruins, with a prodigious slaughter of the people.The earthquake lasted in all about six minutes. At the momentof its beginning, some persons on the liver, near a mile from thecity, heard their boat make a noise as if it had run aground,though they were then in deep water; and at the same time theysaw the houses falling on both sides of the river. The bed of theriver Tagus was in many places raised to its surface. Ships weredriven from their anchors, and jostled together with great violence;nor did their masters know whether they were alloat or aground.A large new quay sunk to an unfathomable depth, with severalhundreds of people upon it; nor was one of the dead ever found.The bar was at lir-t seen dry from shore to shore : but suddenly thesea came rolling in like a mountain ; and about Belem Castle the wa-ter ro-e lifly teet almost in an instant. About noon there was an-other shock; when the walls of several houses that yet remainedopened from top to bottom more than a quarter of a yard, andafterwards elosed again so exactly that scarce any mark" of the in-jury was leit. The number ol people who perished in this dread-fid" catastrophe is said, according to the lowest calculation, toamount to more than sixty thousand ; and (hough the damage inoilier respects cannot he computed, yet some idea may be formedof it, when we consider, that this extensive and opulent city u'asso reduced as to present nothing but a vast heap of ruins; that therich and poor were put.upon a level; some thousands of familieswhich, the day before had been easy in their circumstances, werenow scattered about in the iields, wanting every conveniency oflife, and finding none able to relieve them. This was not the oiilvplace at a liicb the shock was experienced. 'This earthquake wasvery general. St. Uhe’s, a sea-port near Lisbon , was entirelyswallowed up, by the repeated shocks and the vast surf of the sea.The same earthquake was felt over all Spain, except in Catalonia ,Arragon, and Valencia . In many places the sea was agitated inan unusual manner rising six feel every fifteen minutes, and thenfalling so as sometimes to leave the bottom drv. The earthquakewas felt almost as severely in Afriea as it had been in Europe . Greatpart of Algiers was destroyed. At Arzilla (a town in Fez), 10 A.M.the sea suddenly rose with such impetuosity, that it lifted up a ves-sel in the bay, and dropped it with such force on the land, that itwas broke to pieces; and a boat was found two musket shot withinland from the sea. At Fez and Mequinez, great numbers of housesfell, and multitudes of people were buried in the ruins. At Morocco ,by the falling of houses many people lost theirjives : and about eighteagues from the cilv the earth opened and swallowed tip a villagewith all the inhabitants, who were known by the name of the Sonsof Besumba, to the number of about eight or ten thousand per-sons, together with all their cattle, Ac. and soon after the earthdosed again in the same manner as before. In the citv of Fun-chal , in the island of Madeira, a shod; of this earthquake was firsterceived at 3d minutes pasty A. M. It commenced with arnm-ling noise in the air, like that of empty carriages passing hastilyover a stme pavement. The observers felt the floor immediatelyafter move with a tremulous motion, vibrating very quickly. Theshock continued more than a minute; during which spare, the vi-brations, though continual, were weakened and increased in forcetwice verv sensiblv. The increase after the first remission of theshock was the mort intense. The noise in the air accompaniedthe shock during the whole of its continuance, and lasted someseconds alter the motion of the earth had ceased ; dying awayFue a peal of distant thunder rolling through the air. At threequarters past eleven, the sea, which was quite calm, it being a tinevol. it.— no. 70.
day, and no wind stirring, retired suddenly some paces ; thenrising with a great swell without the least noise, and as sud-denly advancing overflowed the shore, and entered the city.
It rose 15 feet perpendicular above the high water mark, althoughthe tide, which llows there 7 feet, was then at half ebb. Suchwere the phamomena w ith which tills remarkable earthquake wasattended in those places where it was.violent. The effects of it,however, reached to an immense distance; and were perceivedchiefly by the agitations of the waters, or some slight motion ofthe earth. The utmost boundaries of this earthquake to the southare unknown; the barbarity of the African nations rendering itimpossible to procure any intelligence from them, except wherethe effects were dreadful. On the north, however, we are assuredthat it reached as far as Nonfay and Sweden . In the former,the waters of several rivers and lakes were violently agitated. Inthe latter, shocks were felt in several provinces, and all the riversand lakes were strongly agitated, especially in Dalecarlia. d ueriver Dala suddenly overflowed its banks, and as suddenly retired.
At the same time a lake three miles distant, which had no com-munication with it, bultbled up with great violence. At Fahlutn,a town in Dalecarlia, several strong shocks were fell. Shocks ofthis great earthquake were felt in several places of France ; parti-cularly at Bayonne, Botirdeaux, and Lyons : and comniotioiis ofthe waters were observed at Angeulesme, Bieviile, Havre deGrace, &c. In many places of Germany its effects were veryperceptible. Throughout the duchy of Holstein, the waters wereviolently agitated, particularly those of the Elbe ami Truve. InBrandenburgh , the water of a lake, called Libsee, ebbed atui flow-ed six times in half an hour, with a dreadful noise, the weatherbeing then perfectly calm. The same agitation was observed, inthe waters of the lakes called Muplgast and Netzo; but at tinsUet place they also emitted an intolerable stench. In Holland the agitations were more remarkable. At Amsterdam , about 11A. M. the air being perfectly calm, the waters were suddenly agi-tated in their canals, so that several boats broke loose; chandelierswere observed to vibrate in the churches; but no motion of (heearth, or concussion of any building, was observed. At Ilaerletn,in the forenoon, for near tour minutes together, not only the wa-ter in tlie rivers, canals, &c. but also all kinds of fluids in smallerquantities, as incooiers, tubs, backs, &c. were surprisingly agitated,and dashed over the sides, though no motion was perceptible inthe vessels themselves. Round the island of Corsica, the sea wasviolently agitated, and most of the rivers of the island overflowedtheir banks. In the city of Milan, and throughout the Milanese,shocks were felt. At Turin there was felt a very violent shock.In Switzerland , many rivers turned suddenly muddy without rain.The lake of Ne.ufchatel swelled near two feet above its naturallevel for a few hours. An agitation was also perceived in the wa-ter of the lake of Zurich. At the island of Antigua, there wassuch a sea without the bar as had not been known in the memoryof man ; and after it, all the water at the wharfs, which'used to besix feet deep, was not two inches. At Barbadoes , about2 P.M. thesea ebbed and flowed in a surprising manner; ran over the wharfsand streets into the houses, and continued thus ebbing and flowingtill ten at night. The agitation of the waters was perceived ingreat numbers of places in Great Britain. At Barlborough inDerbyshire , between 11 and 12 A. M. in a boat-house on the W.side of a large body of water called Pibley dam, was heard a sur-prising and terrible noise; a large swell of water came in a currentfrom the S. and rose two feet on the sloped damhead at the N. endof the water. It then subsided; but returned immediately, thoughw ith less violence. The water was llius agitated for three quartersof an hour; growing gradually weaker and w eaker every time, tillit entirely ceased. At Bushbridge in Surrey , at half an hour afterten in the morning, the weather being remarkably still, without,the least wind, in a canal near 700 feet long, and 58 feet broad,with a small spring constantly running through it, a very unusualnoise was heard at the E. end, and the water there observed to bein great agitatiou. It rose in a heap in the middle, between twoand three feet above its usual level, and extending lengthwaysabout 30 yards. After this, the heap vibrated towards the N.side of the canal with great force, and flowed above eight feet overthe grass walk on that side. On its return back into the canal, itagain rose in the middle, and then heeled with yet greater force tothe south side, and flow ed over its grass walk. During this lattermotion, the bottom on the north side was left dry for several feet.3 M This