Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 7.djvu/757

Rh least noise of thunder. This lasted, at Syracuse, about a quarter of an hour, when there appeared in the air over the city two bows, the colors extremely bright, after the usual manner, and a third with the extremities inverted, and, as not a single cloud was visible in any part of the sky, the abnormal state of the atmosphere is clear. It was also during this summer that the unusually severe thunder-storm occurred at Geneva that so materially affected the future career of the celebrated Robert Boyle. The earthquakes at Jamaica began on the 17th of June, and their greatest violence seems to have been spent in the mountains. Terrific noises were heard among them at Port Royal during the last shock, and they were so torn and rent as to present a very shattered appearance and quite new forms. In this month Etna emitted extraordinarily loud noises for three days together. A singular circumstance, during this catastrophe at Jamaica, was the derangement of the wind. The land-breeze often failed, and the sea-breeze blew all night, whereas the land-breeze should blow all night and the sea-breeze all day. There was an earthquake on September 8, 1692, in Europe, but I have not yet been able to find out the locality.

Space will not admit of more than noticing some special phenomena of the Sicilian earthquakes, 1693. On the 10th of January the castle of Augusta was blown up by the lightning firing the powder-magazine. At Minco, on the 11th, the shock was attended by "a mighty storm of lightning, thunder, and hail, that lasted six hours." The archbishop's palace at Monreal was set on fire by the lightning. Etna emitted great noises, flames, and ashes, during the shocks that overthrew Catania, but there does not appear to have been eruption. Furla, situated among limestone-quarries, disappeared, and at several parts of the hill the rocks, which were previously almost as white as Geneva marble, had changed, and in the clefts made by the earthquake had become of a burnt color, as if fire and powder had been employed to rend them asunder. Millitello seems to have been destroyed before the 11th of January, for the country-people, who dwelt on the neighboring ridge of mountains, affirmed that it was not to be seen on the morning of that day, to which time, from twelve o'clock on the 8th, it had been concealed in a thick fog. During the interval the mountain that lay on the north side of the town had been split asunder—one portion overwhelming Millitello, so that not an inhabitant escaped. Francofonte, built chiefly of wood, escaped with little damage from the shocks, but was fired by lightning; the spire of the church—wood covered with lead—burnt down, and the nunnery of the Carmelites entirely destroyed so suddenly, that five of the nuns were stifled in their beds. The largest part of the inhabitants of Luochela escaped by flying from the town on the sudden disappearance of the castle, situated on a rising ground. Ragusa experienced shocks on the 8th, with violent thunder and lightning. At Specufurno, on the 10th,