This decree states that the slave-owners will be paid for the loss of their slaves; and if the Government has not enough money in its treasury to do this, Great Britain will give what extra money is needed.
It is said that slavery was never abolished in any country with less trouble or disturbance.
No great changes are looked for. The negroes will now be paid for their labor, and have the right to choose their own employers; but it is expected that nearly the whole body of freed slaves will remain on the plantations where they have been working.
It is estimated that about a quarter of a million slaves were liberated.
The United States had a shock of earthquake the
other day, which was felt in the States of Ohio, West Virginia, Tennessee, and Georgia. Buildings were shaken, and in Atlanta the shock was so severe that pictures and wall-hangings were thrown violently from the wall.
An earthquake is a movement of the earth's crust, caused by volcanic action. The earth moves as it were in waves, billowing like the waters of the ocean.
The destructive nature of earthquakes depends very much upon the nature of the ground. Sometimes the movement will be felt very slightly, and no damage will be done. At others, a hard bed of rock will lie in the path of the wave; it will not bend and move the rest of the ground, but splits in two, and then a fissure, or opening in the ground, is formed.