, 1908-05-16
THE JAMAICA EARTHQUAKE.

the Royal Geographical Society, London, in
December last, by DIR. Vaughan Cornish, a
gentleman well known for research work and
writings in ~counexion with Physical Geog-
raphy, etc.
DR.. Cornish happened to be in Jamaica in
January 1906, at the time Of the earthquake.
HIS paper has been reprinted in the Ge0g-
r0phtcu1 journal for March, and the follow
ing is the first of one OF two extracts from it
that may be given in the agricultural
Ne2CS:-
On Thursday, January 10, my wife and 1
arrived at Kingston on our way back from %
visit to the Panama Canal, and took up our
quarters in the centre of Kingston, at the
Grenville Hotel, East Street. This hotel,
which was built in the days of slavery, was
very substantially constructed of brick, with
solid walls IA inches in thickness for their
whole height Of two floors, viz, a ground
floor and q first floor. The roof, @ sloping
one, was Of wooden shingles, and in the
whole structure there was no chimney-stack,
fires not being necessary for warmth in
Kingston, and the kitchen being always sep
arate from the clearinghouse. In front,
that is to say on the west of the house, %
row of massive brick arches formed q ver-
andah to the ground floor, and supported a
covered wooden balcony on the first floor
Our own room was q corner one on the first
that is to say the top floor, having an out
side wall to the south, and another 14-inch
brick wall on the west, with two long
French windows opening into the balcony.
In this room my wife and [ were sitting
at h~alf-past three in the afternoon Of Monday
January IA, when I heard the noise of the
electric car coming from down town, that is
to say from the south. The noise increased,
Of course, till it was opposite the house, and
then just as the rushing should have begun
to diminish, there was u sudden and alarm
ing increase of rushing and rumbling sound,
accompanied by q savage tearing and rend-
ing noise. For u moment | felt no shock.
and did not realize the cause Of the uproar,
bat my wife, who was sitting nearer the wall,
felt a tremor, and realized it was an earth
Quake. The next instant the whole house
was rocking violently q assure opened hor-
~izontally near the top of the west wall facing
me- and q shower of brick work fell near the
threshold of the door. Had my wife hasten
ed to the door on feeling the shock, she
would probably have been struck down at
the moment Of emergency, as happened in
so many cases that day. A cloud of dust
and mortar darkened the air, and the solid
14-inch brick wall vibrated to and fro, dis
charging a cannonade of brick work into the
room. A lump of masonry struck me q
numbing blow on the shin. A heavy mahog-
any wardrobe standing behind me, but fac
ing my wife the way she stood, executed a
clumsy dance, and then pitched over and
the heavy cornice sailed over our heads and
struck my wife in the hip in it's descent.
We were being bombarded both front and
rear, but, even had there been any direction
in which safety could be found, we were
unable 10 fly, for the timber floor was like
~aoo4 H. Fon4 ,c;nr o,I Fon
ing, and opening and shutting, so that we
could see into the unceiled room below.
Up to this point Que knew that these oc'
currences might at any instant terminate
fatally, but the really awful time came
when the house seemed suddenly to lose
its cohesion, and we both realized that in
another second the floor would give way and
the walls fall bodily upon us. At this
supreme moment, with absolute suddenness,
the quaking floor stiffened under our feet,
our environment was simultaneously rigid
and still, and tie noise of the earthquake