The Nevada journal., 1857-03-06
Extraordinary Destruction of an Alpine
Village.

Extraordinary Destruction of an Alpine
Village.
The following description of the de-
struction, last year. of the Alpine village
of Bezandun, in the province of Dauph-
my, was recently given by the Rev, DR..
Murton, pastor of Bordeaux, tDrone,) at
meeting held at Glasgow, Scotland:
DR.. Murton commenced his account
by remarking that the village was evan
gelized by Ferrell, the companion Of
Calvin. 1t was in this country that the
Eaudois took refuge in 1545-47, when
three villages were sacked and utterly
destroyed under Francis |. After the
revocation of Nantes, young man was
martyred His bones were broken in
presence of his parents, and he was
promised liberty and pardon if he re-
eanted, but he refused, and died under
the torture He was the last Protestant
martyr at that time.
The village of Bezandun was built on
the steep slope of a hill. or rock covered
with earth. Different from the granite
in Britain, the rocks lay in smooth strata.
The village thus lay on the smooth sur
face of slanting rock. All the houses
were built across the hill. Above this
were the gardens and vineyards of the
villagers. Further up was the church.
Down the hill there used to flow springs
of water. These springs of water,
strange to say, in consequence of the
large amount of rain which inundated
France, diminished instead of increasing,
and it was found that the fountains were
nearly dry. These symptoms caused
no surprise at the time, but after the
catastrophe all these were remembered.
On the 31st of May, as a colporteur
was passing by, his attention was attrae-
ted by some strange sounds in the
church. A few minutes afterwards the
population were greatly surprised by
few slight strokes of the church bell
Immediately afterwards, in the houses
in the village, the windows commenced
to break, and the walls were displaced;
so that the doors, which were shut, could
not be opened. The population ran out
of their houses. mothers dragging their
children after them, while the tiles,
chimneys and lighter parts of the houses
fell. From the great surprise with which
they were struck, the people did not
think to take any of their valuables
with them But they were no sooner
out of their houses, than the roof of the
church fell in; and, among other things,
a bible, 24O years old, was buried i'll the
rubbish, but was ultimately recovered,
and is still preserved. Although the
roof of the church fell in, and the church
was tilted up obliquely, the walls did
not fall for six or seven days. For some
days the people were at a loss to under
stand whether or not it was an earth
quake. About quarter of an hour af-
ter the alarm commenced, a whole row
of houses fel. 1t appeared that the
springs of water, which used to flow over
the surface from the summit of the hill
had this time flowed under ground, and
reaching at last the rocky substratum,
got beneath the soil on which the village
stood.
The consequence was, the soil got
soaked and commenced to slip down the
hill, with the village on it, in some
what irregular manner. Sometimes it
seemed to be caught, sometimes it rose
in waves, which accounted for the way
in which the church was found. The
ruins of the church and village formed
an obstacle to the gradual slipping down
of the soil, so above them the ground
was slipping. While, in the evening.
the inhabitants were going about their
vocations as usual, in the morning there
was nothing to be seen of the village
it had disappeared. 1t appeared as if
the earth had swallowed up the village,
but as the soil gradually continued to
slip down, the village came again into
sight. The relative position of many of
the houses was completely changed
Two houses, situated, the one out of
the village, and the other at the other
end, were found after the catastrophe
close together; and, strange to say, the
proprietors of both houses were at law
with one another!