Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 October 1884 — EARTHQUAKE EXPERIENCES. [ARTICLE]

EARTHQUAKE EXPERIENCES.

A Talk with an Old Traveler in South Ainc ic i “Do you agree with other authorities that the terror caused by earthquakes is. steadily augmented in proportion to the number of shocks experienced ?” “Undoubtedly! It is a fear that grows by what it feeds on. . When you actually experience the sensation causecUby an earthquake, and nothing else, it is not alone the awful sense of the instability of the earth that demoralizes and appalls you. The frightful capriciousness and uncertainty as to the result adds to this sense. It may mean only an inconsequential shiver, or the whole bottom of the earth may be about to fall out, you can’t tell which. If we should become stfbject to earthquakes hereabouts, it would be some consolation if we could only havff a range of volcanic mountains, such as border most earthquake countries, to signal or quiet our fears. “The expression, ‘Thank Heaven, the mountains are smoking!’ is an oft-re-peated one in the western trend of the Cordilleras. It has grown out of the general impression there that when Lie volcanoes are active a relief is afforded the pent-up fiery sources, whose violent efforts for deliverance would otherwise cause the dreaded terramote that has so often proved the destruction of cities, the destruction of populous districts, and an incalculable source of suffering and death.” “Were some of your earthquake experiences of an interesting nature ?” “I should say sb, and decidedly ticklish to. boot. The winter and summer 1 spent iu Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Chili were distinguished by frequent earth tremors, though not signalized Jby any great local shock, such as destroyed Mendoza, with two-thirds of its inhabitants, a few years previously, or by any disastrous, long-rolling, subterranean and submarine wave, such as, later, and even so recently as 1877, swept the Pacific Coast, wiping out Concepcion, Talcahuana, and other minor Chilian ports, by the overbrimming of the sea water, as so many pictured towns might be sponged from a schoolboy’s slate, landing au American man-of-war high and dry at Callao, which was also greatly damaged, and upheaving a tidal wave whose mysterious pulse throbbed across the Pacific, submerging islands, clamoring at the portals of remote harbors, and expending its dying heart-break upon the headlands of China and Japan. The. shock felt here on the 10th was no more than a flea bite to what I felt in South America. Yet, for the reasons 1 have mentioned, even such a paltry shock there would have been infinitely more significant and awe inspiring.” "Is the theory that while the volcanoes smoke no serious convulsions may’ be feared generally borne out by experience?” “Not always, though in the majority ,of cases. Nor can you always rely on another favorite hypothesis equally prevalent down yonder. The latter, supposes that a great earthquake invariably occurs in three successive shocks, the second being severer than the first, and the third being the maximum that either upsets everything Or indicates the final expenditure of the throe. These theories have frequently been disproved by the events themselves, and, in more than one instance, by my own observation. The one tremendous crash that destroyed Mendoza came like it thunderbolt out of a* cleat sky, and with even le-s premonition. The last earthquake that demolished Caracas was preceded by- only one shock, and that a heavy one. Of the thirty or more earthquakes that I experienced, chiefly in Chili, less than a fourth of them ’conformed to the mysterious rule of three, so persisted iu by the natives, while many were marked by five or six distinct shocks or vibrations, of varying violence, and following no order of sequence whatever of time, force, or effect. So much for their rule of three. The volcanic smoke-vent theory is weakened by numerous examples. In my own experience. full half the shocks I felt were in sight of volcanic peaks smoking freely. The disturbances in Sicily are almost invariably accompanied by volcanic vomitings, and I never heard of a great convulsion in the Sandwich Islands that was not attended by an eruption of the neighboring craters. — New York Sun.