Page:The Philosophy of Earthquakes, Natural and Religious.djvu/89

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Earthquakes.
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that way too, to Lincoln. For which reaſon, as there meeting the fame coming from Boſton, the ſhock was moſt ſenſibly felt. It reach’d likewiſe to the Trent at Nottingham, which convey’d it to Newark.

The firſt electrical ſtroke ſeems to have been made on the high ground above Daventry, in Northamptonſhire; where the Roman camps are, made by P. Oſtorius the proprætor. From thence it deſcended chiefly eaſtward, and along the river Welland, from Harborough to Stamford, Spalding, the ſea: and along the river Avon, or Nen, to Northampton, Peterborough, Wiſbech to the ſea. It ſpread itſelf all over the vaſt level of the iſle of Ely; further’d by very many canals, and rivers, natural, and artificial, made for drainage. It was ſtill conducted eaſtward up Mildenhall river, in Suffolk, to Bury, and the parts adjacent. All this affair duly conſider’d, is a confirmation of the doctrine I advanc’d on this ſubject.

10ly, I apprehend, it was not the noiſe in the air, as of many cannon let off at once, preceding the earthquake, that ſo much affrighted people, or affected the ſheep, the rookery at Kenſington, the hen and chickens in Gray’s-inn-lane, the pigeons. It could not be barely the ſuperficial movement of the earth, that diſturb’d them all at once. I judge it to be the effect of electricity, ſomewhat like what cauſes ſea ſickneſs; ſuch a ſort of motion, as we are

not