Page:Great Neapolitan Earthquake of 1857.djvu/310

256 a great spread of gable, and front parallel to this little house, present evidences of great violence here, and extremely steep emergence of the wave. The house (Fig. 132) is fissured from wall plate and ground, in the north

and south walls, near the quoins, and over the entrance door, the lintel of which, a single slab of limestone of about 12 in. by 22 in. wide, is fractured right through by the rocking of the wall at either side of it. The roof is all fallen in, except one purlin, which is still in situ, and proves, on examining its ends in the gable walls, that the east gable, and the roof along with it, all came to the eastward, at the first movement of shock, drawing the purlins from their sockets in the west gable; some were drawn quite out, and the roof at once fell in; others returned by the back stroke of the wave, and drove the ends of the remaining purlins, back again into their sockets like battering rams, throwing out portions and dislocating the west gable. The north-west quoin has had a long wedge-shaped mass projected right outwards, showing a very steep angle of emergence. The dislocations generally, here and at the opposite side of the road, give evidence of a wave-path from E. to W., and an angle of emergence of upwards of 45° with the horizon. I did not measure any