9
who alighted from a mail coach, and hurried back to his own residence—that is when he saw the snow falling so fast—under the firm impression that his presence was imperiously called on to avert something like absolute ruin.
———
In 1755, they had in Turin a great fall of rain; and as it generally snows in the mountains, when it only rains in the plain, it cannot appear surprising, that during this interval, there fell vast quantities of snow on the mountains, which of course formed several valancas. The bad weather which prevailed in so many other places, prevailed likewise at Bergemoletto, a little hamlet, seated in that part of the Alps which separates the valley of Stura and Piedmont from Dauphine and the country of Nice.
On March 19th, many of the inhabitants of this hamlet began to apprehend that the weight of the snow which was already fallen, and still continued to fall, might crush their houses, which are built with stones peculiar to the country, cemented by nothing but mud, and a very small portion of lime, and covered with thatch laid on the roof of shingles, and large thin stones, supported by thick beams. They therefore got upon their roofs, to lighten them of the snow.
