The
morning was close and cloudy: what little breeze there was came from the
south-west, under a leaden sky and over a leaden sea. At 8.10 A.M., as we
were returning from the rocks about three-quarters of a mile off, there
was a sudden rambling like a distant thunder-clap; the sands seemed to
wave up and down as a shaken carpet, and we both staggered forwards.
Others described the movement as rising and falling like the waters of a
lagoon. I looked with apprehension at the sea; but the direction of the
shock was apparently from west-north-west; and the line was too oblique to
produce one of those awful earthquake-waves, seventy feet high, which have
swept tall ships over the roofs of cities. We ran as fast as we could to
the town, where everything was in the wildest confusion. The 'Big House'
and Mr. John Hansen's were mere ruins; the Court-house had come to pieces,
and the prison-cells yawned open. I distinctly saw that the rock-ledge
under Akra, between Fort James and Crevecoeur, had been upraised: canoes
passed over what was now dry. A second shock at 8.20 A.M., and a third
about 10.45, completed the destruction, split every standing wall, and
shook down the three forts into ruinous heaps.
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