of one great
volcano, was in eruption in the year 1693. Different parts of the cone
fell, one after the other, into a deep crater, until almost half the
space of the island was converted into a fiery lake. Most of the
inhabitants fled to Banda; but great pieces of the mountain continued to
fall down, so that the lake of lava became wider; and finally the whole
population was compelled to emigrate. It is stated that, in proportion
as the burning lake increased in size, the earthquakes were less
vehement.[706]

_Jamaica_, 1692.--In the year 1692, the island of Jamaica was visited by
a violent earthquake; the ground swelled and heaved like a rolling sea,
and was traversed by numerous cracks, two or three hundred of which were
often seen at a time, opening and then closing rapidly again. Many
people were swallowed up in these rents; some the earth caught by the
middle, and squeezed to death; the heads of others only appeared above
ground; and some were first engulfed, and then cast up again with great
quantities of water. Such was the devastation, that even in Port Royal,
then the capital, where more houses are said to have been left standing
than in the whole island besides, three-quarters of the buildings,
together with the ground they stood on, sank down with their inhabitants
entirely under water.

_Subsidence in the harbor._--The large storehouses on the harbor side
subsided, so as to be twenty-four, thirty-six, and forty-eight feet
under water; yet many of them appear to have remained standing, for it
is stated that, after the earthquake, the mast-heads of several ships
wrecked in the harbor, together with the chimney-tops of houses, were
just seen projecting above the waves. A tract of land round the town,
about a thousand acres in extent, sank down in less than one minute,
during the first shock, and the sea immediately rolled in. The Swan
frigate, which was repairing in the wharf, was driven over the tops of
many buildings, and then thrown upon one of the roofs, through which it
broke. The breadth of one of the streets is said to have been doubled by
the earthquake.

According to Sir H. De la Beche, the part of Port Royal described as
having sunk was built upon newly formed land, consisting of sand, in
which piles had been driven; and the _settlement_ of this loose sand,
charged with the weight of heavy houses, may, he suggests, have given
rise to the subsidence alluded to.[707]

There have undoubtedly been i