We have just received the following letter from the director of the astronomical observatory of Capodimente:
"Sir,
"I hasten to inform you that last night at ten minutes after ten o'clock, French time, a shock of earthquake took place which lasted about four or five seconds; two minutes afterwards another shock of much greater intensity occurred, which lasted about 25 seconds. They were both undulatory, and proceeded from the south to the north. The severity of the second shock was apparent from the circumstance that two pendulum clocks belonging to this observatory, which were oscillating in the direction of the prime vertical, were stopped, but three others were not affected. The foundation of the tower in which our equatorial instrument is placed also sustained injury. We were also conscious of three successive, but slight shocks, at three and at five in the morning, lasting about a second."
December 13.—To continue the sad report which has just reached us from Principato Citeriore relative to the earthquake. We must repeat that the telegraph from Eboli to Sala has been interrupted, and that the accounts which have reached us from the second of these communes are most distressing. Trusting that the facts are exaggerated, we shall communicate them as we have received them; and it is our painful duty to state that three deaths have occurred in Sala, and that the district prison, the barracks, and other buildings are injured; in Atena, half of the houses are shattered; in Padula, more than a hundred houses have been injured, and the number of deaths is unknown; in Polla, the disasters are immense, and the victims numerous, among which the brigade of gendarmes, the belfry and church of Saldina, near Salerno, are injured; two ladies killed. In Campagna many houses are destroyed, including that of the Sub-intendant.
We have this moment received a telegraphic despatch from the Intendant of Basilicata, informing us that much damage has been done in Potenza, many houses being thrown down, and an unknown number of people buried beneath the ruins. We have learned
