distinguish objects by it; and D. Girolamo, afterwards a victim of the disaster, fancying robbers were in the house, got up and called his sons to assist him in searching through it. A similar light was perceived on the night of the catastrophe. Oh! weak foresight of man! This wretched family, disinterred from the ruins of their own house, might have escaped this misfortune and saved their father's life. The faithful dog remained for several days motionless on the spot where his master perished, howling and refusing food. The creature would be worthy of a place among the celebrated animals of Signor de Rozan.
The crevices in the ground in this territory are very considerable, and an immense calcareous mass on the bank of a torrent denominated Casale, was cleft in two, as if by lightning, and half of it precipitated down the declivity, destroying the olive and other trees. As yet the number of deaths is estimated at 80, but the true number cannot be precisely known. The land of the Æolian harp, once the delight of young and old, is now sunk in squalor and sepulchral silence! The estimable Signor D. Antonio Romania, of Marsico, informed me, that for a considerable time, that great valley (near which along the course of the Agri undoubtedly lay the centre of convulsion) was covered in the morning with a thick black mist, afterwards dispersed by the sun, the disc of which was dark, and the rays as intense as during the summer season; and that for some days previously to the earthquake, hollow sounds were heard in the air. These noises, too, preceded all the subsequent shocks. He adds that after the 18th, the rivers and springs increased very much, and some emitted, and are still emitting, exhalations, in which a strong sulphureous smell predominates. Large fissures have been observed throughout this territory from which a dense smoke, of disagreeable odour, frequentiy issues. Recent risings and swellings of the ground have been observed.
In Calvello, loud subterraneous noise and light, and whistling in the air were the precursors of the disaster; in the country the sky was vividly lighted up towards the south. During the night, fiery meteors preceded the repeated shocks. A few days afterwards, a fire, considered electrical, broke out of the ground in the district of S. Pietro, set fire to two large oaks, which were
