San Marcos free press. [volume] (San Marcos, Tex.) 1877-1892, 1883-08-16
Earthquake.
81. Louis Republican.

The convulsion that recently brought
down the city on the island of Ischia
in ruins and destroyed 5000 to 5000
lives, reminds us of our profound lg-
norance of the cause of these awful
phenomena and our utter helplessness
in the presence Of them. All that we
know of earthquakes can be told IN
few words. They are popularity con-
nected with volcanoes, and regions
remote from these smoking earth-vents
are supposed to be free from their
visitation. But there were hundred
earthquakes in the vicinity of New
Madrid attended by strange and awful
changes in, the confguration of the
country in I'LL, without volcano
nearer than 1, 500 miles; and the great
earthquake of the last century, which
submerged the quay at Lisbon five
fathoms deep, causing 10000 persons
to perish, was not preceded or followed
by any volcanic Eruption in the vicin-
ity. Earth. tremors of an alarming
character frequently in the Mis-
sissippi valley,-in New England and
in Canada; and twelve years ago a
series of vibrations, accompanied by
the bursting of flames from the ground
and the cracking of walls of high
buildings spread dismay through a
large section of California, although
there is not live volcano nearer than
seven hundred miles. There are be-
tween three and four hundred volca-
noes known upon the earth, in addi-
ton to an unknown number in the
ocean, and three-fourth of these are
in islands, while the greater proper
ton of those on continents are near
the sea- fact which seems to show
a connection between the ocean waters
and the great subterranean laborato-
ries where the earth throes are pro-
duced. Volcanoes observe certain
order which is observed without being
comprehend; they are ranged in
meridanal lines from north to south,
with spurs projecting east and west.
One of these ranges runs from Ben
rings straits through Eastern Asia
and the Pacific islands towards the
South pole; another runs along the
Pacific coast of North and South
America; and a third includes a sub
marine elevation in the Atlantic ocean,
the island of Iceland, the Azores, the
Canaries and some of the West In
dies. The mighty workings in the
bowels of the earth which produce
volcanoes may, and probably do, pro
duce the tremors, vibrations and fall
lngs of the surface which we call
earthquakes; but these awful move
ments and the tidal waves which
sometimes attend them often occur
at places far distant from live volca-
noes. The mystery enclosed beneath
the crust of the earth on which we
walk has hitherto baffled all efforts to
solve it. The geological theory of
forty years ago which held the inte-
rior of the globe to be frey molten
mass has been abandoned, and new
one is now suggested that the earth
in mainly solid, cold mass of matter
to it's center, with occasional cavities
and reservoirs where chemical forces
find field for action. Some hold
that earth throbs are caused by lurches
of melted matter, OF steam explosions
in these reservoirs; others that they
are the effect of those chemical COM
'binations on large scale which, even
in a students laboratory, are attended
by explosions and shocks; while others
still find an explanation of all sub
terrsnean tumults in electrical cotton.
Whatever be the cause there is no
Disgusting the terror and dismay they
invariably inspire, alike in the minds
of the wise and the foolish, the learned
and the ignorant.
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