The weekly Arizona miner., 1868-10-31
Earthquakes in History.

During the first half of this century 3,240 of these yisitations were noticed, or about one every week. In Europe, during the last ten years, there have been 32O earthquakes, or one every nine days At the commence ment of the fifteenth century, only 15O of these shocks had found place in history. During the next 300 years. ?, s04 earthquakes are recorded or almost four times as many as during all the preceding ages. From these facts it has been inferred that, whatever may be the origin of these upheayings of the crust of the earth, the phenomena are greatly in- creasing in number, and their causes in yio- lence.
 Among the earliest earthquakes reported is that by which the famous Herculaneum and Pompei were destroyed in the year 63. ] Fifty-two years after this, Antioch. in Syria, was almost entirely destroyed, the calamity l occurring just at the time the then Emperor \ Trajan, was on visit to the place. In 45s 1 it was again visited with an earthquake, and l then again in j26, the number of persons per ishing in the ruins on this latter occasion be- ! ing estimated at quarter of million. ! In 1909, Port Royal the capital of Jamaica, was entirely submerged hy the force of an earthquake, which swallowed up oyera thou sand acres, and drove ships so far inland that 
 In l772, an entire volcano sunk into the earth in the Island of Java, carrying with it forty villages, the mountain itself which was fifteen miles long and six broad, accompany
 ing the hamlets and their 2957 inhabitants.
 On the lst of November, l7jJ, occurred the memorable earthquake at Lisbon by
 which 6O,0O0 people perished in the twinkling : of an eye. Here, also, was the great tidal
 wave seen at an altitude of fifty feet One
 Of the most awful incidents of this earth quake was the sinking of the city quay. 1his
 had just been constructed of marble at an i immense expense, and to 1t, as a last refuge
 fled thousands of the hapless inhabitants
 Without a moments warning the earth sud
 denly opened to receive it, and after sucking
 in the mass must have closed over it, as not a
 single body of all the thousands that went down, nor the least spar or ark from any of
 the tships near by that were sucked into the chasm, ever came to the top. The water
 there is near six hundred fathoms deep. and
 at an unknown distance beneath the bottom repose the hapless Lisbonese. This Lisbon
 earthquake, Humboldt estimates, affected . portion of the earth four times as large as
 Europe, and was felt in the Alps, on the coasts of Sweden, in the West Indies, or Lake Ontario, and along the coast of Massa- : chusetts
 In lSll, the earthquakes on the Mississippi ! severest at New Madrid, Missouri, shook th, , ground for many days, and alternately raised and depressed it here and there, the iattel
 sections forming a section called the sunker i country to this day.
 f On the 26th March, 1sl2, violent thun-
 der storm. with incessant flashes, was ob.
 served by the people of New Madrid, and al
 the same tune the city of Carracas, in Souti D America, was laid in ruins, twelve thousand r of it's people perishing.
 The great eruption of Vesuvius, in 1857 a with accompanying earthquakes, will also b | remembered as leading to an immense destruc : tion of human life, yariously estimated a
 from 22,000 to 400O0 lives.
 e In 1858, June 18th, the valley of Mexic . was also devastated by one of these visita IT tions, demolishing houses throughout it f length and destroying the costly aqueduc I. supplying the city with water.
 March p, 1859, Quito, in Ecuador, wa e nearly destroyed by an earthquake, ano
 thousands of lives were lost.-N y. World