Alexandria gazette & daily advertiser. [volume] (Alexandria [Va.]) 1817-1822, 1819-08-09
t.ined, Of blue clay, the upper straits

, talneu, OF DUO $tdJs TUG upper sudW
which were broken and turned up in man
ner similar to cakes of ice, when stopped
in an overlooking stream. There were
on the ground, dwelling house and pot
ter's shop, which we're overturned and
dashed to pieces, and the furniture entire
ly destroyed The frightened inhabitants
luckily warned of their danger by the
cracking of the house for few minutes be-
fore the CONFUSION, had just made their
escape. The walls and contents of the
cellar sunk between the fragments of clay,
and the garden, orchard, &c. with trees
buried to their tops, exhibit melancholy
scene of ruin. The bed of the river, which
was clay, and more than twenty feet deep
in that place, was raised by the conclusion
so as to stop the water for Z or hours,
when il cui new channel. -
The novelty of the event has attracted
thousands Of spectators to view the ruins.
A public dinner has been given to Mr..
Speaker CLAY, at Hopkinsonville, Ken
lucky, at which he gave the following
toast, which is good one -" The best
remedy for hard times--increased produc'
tions-diminished expenditures. +"
INTELLIGENCE IN LITERATURE AND THE
ARTS.
LieuteRant Hende has pleasingly added
| to that fullness of information which, within
these few years, has been laid before the
world, in relation to the Asiatic countries
lying between India and Constentinople,
and traversed in the overland journey
To, various novel information relative to
Babylon, has Mr.. H. added an account OF
I, the site on which Moses and bis common
tators have agreed in placing the Garden
Of Eden and has illustrated bis descrip-
ton by view. The site is now called
Korna, and it is a wretched marsh, over.
grown with rusbes, shaded by few palms,
and containing about fifty or sixty misera-
bic huts, while the neighboring district is
miserable wilderness. [Phil. paper.
CHINESE METHOD OF TAKING WILD FOWL.
Whenever The fowler sees a number of
ducks settled in any particular plash of
water, he sends off two or three gourds 10
float among them. These gourds resemble
our pompions; but, being ade hollow,
they swim on the surface of the water, and
in one pool there may sometimes be seen
twenty or thirty of these gourds floating to-
gether. AT first the fowl are shy at coming
near them, but by degrees they approach
nearer; and as all birds at length grow ia
miliar with scare crow, the ducks gather
about them, and amuse themselves by whet-
ting their bills against them.
When the birds are as familiar with the
Gourds as the fowler could wish, he pre-
pares to deceive them more efeCtually.-
He hollows out one of these gourds large
enough to put his head in; and making
holes to breathe and see through, he claps
it on bis head. Thus ACQUIRED, he wades
slowly into the water, keeping his body
under, and nothing but his head in the
gourd above the surface; in that manner
he moves imperceptibly towards the fowls,
who suspect no danger. AT last, however,
he fairly gets liz among them while they
having been long used to see gourds. take
not the least alarm while the enemy is in
the midst OF them and an nsidiouS enemy
he is for, whenever he approaches fowl,
he seizes it by the legs, and draws it in a
jerk under water there he fastens it under
his girdle, and proceeds to the next, till
he has loaded himself with as many as he
can carry away. When he has got his
quantity, without ever attempting to dis
turb the rest of the fowls on the pool, he
slowly moves off again and in this manner
pays the flock three or four visits in day.
Ofall the varieis articles for catching fowl,
this seems likely TO be attended with the
greatest success, and it is the most practi-
sed in China.
EXCAVATION IN TAURIs.
"In the course of some recent diggings,
near Fanagoria. i'm the government of Tau.