When the circles of commotion intersect one another — when, for instance, an elevated plain lies between two volcanoes simultaneously in a state of eruption, several wave-systems may exist together, as in fluids, and not mutually disturb one another. We may even suppose 'interference' p 205 to exist here, as in the intersecting waves of sound. The extent of the propagated waves of commotion will be increased on the upper surface of the earth, according to the general law of mechanics, by which, on the transmission of motion in elastic bodies, the stratum lying free on the one side endeavors to separate itself from the other strata.
Waves of commotion have been investigated by means of the pendulum and the seismometer* with tolerable accuracy in respect to their direction and total intensity, but by no means with reference to the internal nature of their alternations and their periodic intumescence.
[footnote] *[This instrument, in its simplest form, consists merely of a basin filled with some viscid liquid, which, on the occurrence of a shock of an earthquake of sufficient force to disturb the equilibrium of the building in which it is placed, is tilted on one side, and the liquid made to rise in the same direction, thus showing by its height the degree of the disturbance. Professor J. Forbes has invented an instrument of this nature, although on a greatly improved plan. It consists of a vertical metal rod, having a ball of lead movable upon it. It is supported upon a cylindrical steel wire, which may be compressed at pleasure by means of a screw. A lateral movement, such as that of an earthquake, which carries forward the base of the instrument, can only act upon the ball through the medium of the elasticity of the wire, and the direction of the displacement will be indicated by the plane of vibration of the pendulum. A self-registering apparatus is attached to the machine. See Professor J. Forbes's account of his invention in 'Edinb. Phil. Trans.', vol. xv., Part i.] — Tr.
In the city of Quito, which lies at the foot of a still active volcano (the Rucu Pichincha), and at an elevation of 9540 feet above the level of the sea, which has beautiful cupolas, high vaulted churches, and massive edifices of several stories, I have often been astonished that the violence of the nocturnal earthquakes so seldom causes fissures in the walls, while in the Peruvian plains oscillations apparently much less intense injure low reed cottages. The natives, who have experienced many hundred earthquakes, believe that the difference depends less upon the length or shortness of the waves, and the slowness or rapidity of the horizontal vibrations.* than on the uniformity of the motion in opposite directions.
[footnote] * "Tutissimum est cum vibrat crispante Aedificiorum crepitu; et cum intumescit assurgens alternoque motu residet, innoxium et cum concurrentia tecta contrario ictu arietant; quoniam alter motus alteri renititur. Undantis inclinatio et fluctus more quaedam volutatio investa est, aut cum in unam partem totus se motus impellitae — Plin., ii., 82.
The circling rotatory commotions are the most uncommon, but, at the same time, the most dangerous. Walls were observed to be twisted, but not thrown down; rows of trees turned from their previous parallel direction; p 206 and fields covered with different kinds of plants found to be displaced in the great earthquake of Riobamba, in the province of Quito, on the 4th of February, 1797, and in that of Calabria, between the 5th of February and the 28th of March, 1782. The phenomenon of the inversion or displacement of fields and pieces of land, by which one is made to occupy the place of another, is connected with a translatory motion or penetration of separate terrestrial strata. When I made the plan of the ruined town of Riobamba, one particular spot was pointed out to me, where all the furniture of one house had been found under the ruins of another. The loose earth had evidently moved like a fluid in currents, which must be assumed to have been directed first downward, then horizontally, and lastly upward. It was found necessary to appeal to the 'Audiencia', or Council of Justice, to decide upon the contentions that arose regarding the proprietorship of objects that had been removed to a distance of many hundred roises.
In countries where earthquakes are comparatively of much less frequent occurrence (as for instance, in Southern Europe), a very general belief prevails, although unsupported by the authority of inductive reasoning,* that a calm, an oppressive p 207 heat and a misty horizon, are always the forerunners of this phenomenon.
[footnote] *Even in Italy they have begun to observe that earthquakes are unconnected with the state of the weather, that is to say, with the appearance of the heavens immediately before the shock. The numerical results of Friedrich Hoffmann ('Hinterlassene Werke', bd. ii., 366-376) exactly correspond with the experience of the Abbate Scina of Palermo. I have myself several times observed reddish clouds on the day of an earthquake, and shortly before it on the 4th of November, 1799, I experienced two sharp shocks at the moment of a loud clap of thunder. ('Relat. Hist.', liv. iv., chap. 10.) The Turin physicist, Vassalli Eaudi, observed Volta's electrometer to be strongly agitated during the protracted earthquake of Pignerol, which lasted from the 2d of April to the 17th of May, 1808; 'Journal de Physique', t. lxvii., p. 291. But these indications presented by clouds, by modifications of atmospheric electricity, or by calms, can not be regarded as 'generally' or 'necessarily' connected with earthquakes, since in Quito, Peru, and Chili, as well as in Canada and Italy, many earthquakes are observed along with the purest and clearest skies, and with the freshest land and sea breezes. But if no meteorological phenomenon indicates the coming earthquake either on the morning of the shock or a few days previously, the influence of certain periods of the year (the vernal and autumnal equinoxes), the commencement of the rainy season in the tropics after long drought, and the change of the monsoons (according to general belief), can not be overlooked, even though the genetic connection of meteorological processes with those going on in the interior of our globe is still enveloped in obscurity. Numerical inquiries on the distribution of earthquakes throughout the course of the year, such as those of Von Hoff, Peter Merian, and Friedrich Hoffmann, bear testimony to their frequency at the periods of equinoxes. It is singular that Pliny, at the end of his fanciful theory of earthquakes, names the entire frightful phenomenon a subterranean storm; not so much in consequence of the rolling sound which frequently accompanies the shock, as because the elastic forces, concussive by their tension, accumulate in the interior of the earth when they are absent in the atmosphere! "Ventos in causa esse non dubium reor. Neque enim unquam intemiscunt terre, nisi sopito mari, coeloque adeo tranquillo, ut volatus avium non pendeant, subtracto omni spiritu qui vehit; nec unquam nisi post ventos conditos, scilicet in venas et cavernas ejus occulto afflatu. Neque aliad est in terra tremor, quam in nube toonitruum; nec hiatus aliud quam cum fulmen erumpit, incluso spiritu luctante et ad libertatem exire nitente." (Plin., ii., 79.) The germs of almost every thing that has been observed of imagined on the causes of earthquakes, up to the present day, may be found in Seneca, 'Nat. Quaest.', vi., 4-31.
The fallacy of this popular opinion is not only refuted by my own experience, but likewise by the observations of all those who have lived many years in districts where, as in Cumana, Quito, Peru, and Chili, the earth is frequently and violently agitated. I have felt earthquakes in clear air and a fresh east wind, as well as in rain and thunder storms. The regularity of the horary changes in the declination of the magnetic needle and in the atmospheric pressure remained undisturbed between the tropics on the days when earthquakes occurred.*
[footnote] *I have given proof that the course of the horary variations of the barometer is not affected before or after earthquakes, in my 'Relat. Hist.', t. i., p. 311 and 513.