RUINED DWELLING, CHARLESTON.
followed the revolution was supposed to express the Divine displeasure at their short-sightedness.
But one shock, though a very general one, is recorded during the next one hundred and sixty-six years. Then in 1551 a slight tremor upset the people’s furniture and dinner pots in a portion of Surrey. Twenty years afterward a severe shock in Herefordshire was accompanied by a landslide. A large portion of a hill slowly descended during two days, turning a half circle as it came, as though on a pivot.
In 1574 a sharp vibration shook northern and western England at the hour for vespers. Suppliants in Norton Chapel were thrown prostrate and fled in terror, believing the dead were rising through the floor. Part of Ruthin Castle was thrown down.
In 1580, April 6, nearly all England was alarmed by a violent shock. The great bell at Westminster rang the alarm; others joined in. Students of the Temple rushed into the streets; stones fell from St. Paul’s; showers of chimneys in the streets maimed several persons; a panic ensued at Christ Church, where two people were killed by falling stones, and several were maimed in the wild rush to escape from the building. Parts of the fortifications at Dover were overthrown; also several churches and castles were damaged. May 1 of the same year the shocks were again felt in Kent, during the night. This is one of the most notable of British earthquakes; it passed eastward through Belgium to Cologne.
But it is needless to pursue the record further. Only two unusual features are presented among the many earthquakes following: one in 1731 was confined to an area six miles by five; and one in 1734 exhibited a peculiar rotary motion, shaking persons in bed around at right angles to their former positions.
Summing up the record, we find that in the 10th century one earthquake is recorded in England; during the 11th, ten; during the 12th, twelve; during the 13th, thirteen; during the 14th, four; during the 15th, one; six in the 16th; twenty in the 17th, and eighty-four in the eighteenth. The present has also had a fair quota. But if we consider the damage to property, or the fatality, we must conclude that no country in the world is so favored in this matter of earthquakes as Great Britain, unless it may be Germany.