old woman and her son, and his wife.
These people in the evening, which was very dark and tempestuous,
observed that the brick floors of their kitchens began to heave and part;
and that the walls seemed to open, and the roofs to crack; but they all
agree that no tremor of the ground, indicating an earthquake, was ever
felt; only that the wind continued to make a most tremendous roaring in
the woods and hangers. The miserable inhabitants, not daring to go to
bed, remained in the utmost solicitude and confusion, expecting every
moment to be buried under the ruins of their shattered edifices. When
daylight came they were at leisure to contemplate the devastations of the
night: they then found that a deep rift, or chasm, had opened under their
houses, and torn them, as it were, in two; and that one end of the barn
had suffered in a similar manner: that a pond near the cottage had
undergone a strange reverse, becoming deep at the shallow end, and so
vice versa; that many large oaks were removed out of their perpendicular,
some thrown down, and some fallen into the heads of neighbouring trees;
and that a gate was thrust forward, with its edge, full six feet, so as
to require a new track to be made to it. From the foot of the cliff the
general course of the ground, which is pasture, inclines in a moderate
descent for half a mile, and is interspersed with some hillocks, which
were rifted, in every direction, as well towards the great woody hanger,
as from it. In the first pasture the deep clefts began; and running
across the lane, and under the buildings, made such vast shelves that the
road was impassable for some time: and so over to an arable field on the
other side, which was strangely torn and disordered. The second pasture-
field, being more soft and springy, was protruded forward without many
fissures in the turf, which was raised in long ridges resembling graves,
lying at right angles to the motion. At the bottom of this enclosure the
soil and turf rose many feet against the bodies of some oaks that
obstructed their farther course, and terminated this awful commotion.

The perpendicular height of the precipice in general is twenty-three
yards; the length of the lapse or slip as seen from the fields below, one
hundred and eighty-one; and a partial fall, concealed in the coppice,
extends seventy yards more; so that the total length of this fragment
that fell was two hundred and fifty-one yards. About fifty acres of l