A.D. 1701, there happened an eruption of Vesuvius: the year following, 1702, the family seat of Borge, near Frederickstadt, in Norway, sunk, with all its towers and battlements, into an abyss one hundred fathoms deep, and its site was instantly filled with water, which formed a lake three hundred ells long and one hundred and thirty broad. Many persons, together with upwards of 200 head of cattle, perished. A comet was seen about this period; and in the next year, 1703, small-pox and scarlatina raged at Boston, United States; in other of the States they were attended with fever of a most malignant type. During this period the drought was extreme; the autumn was sultry, with cold damp nights, north winds, and frequent showers; bilious plague broke out in the city of New York, and was more fatal than at any other previous period; it was termed ‘the great sickness.’ Ergotism prevailed throughout the whole country of Freiburg. A dreadful thunder-storm was experienced in England on the 26th and 27th of November of this year, which frightened the whole kingdom; the houses in London were violently shaken, and many fell; the water rose to a great height at Westminster Hall, and London Bridge was choked up with the wrecks of boats, &c.; fourteen ships of war were lost during the storm, with great numbers of seamen. The damage done by it in London alone was computed at one million pounds sterling: at the same time Rome was shaken by an earthquake, and the city of Aquila, in the kingdom of Naples, was destroyed; many thousand persons were buried in its ruins. The year following, 1704, there was an eruption of Vesuvius. CHAPTER VII. FROM A.D. 1705 TO 1795. A.D. 1705, in the city of Ceuta, an epidemic malignant fever broke out, and raged with dreadful violence, causing great mortality. The appearances on dissection, as reported by Don Antonio de la Locha, proto-medicus of the army, were as follow: “The blood was observed to be coagulated in the ventricles of the heart, especially in that of the right side, and also in the vena cava (in the immediate neighbourhood of the heart); the pulmonary artery was similarly engorged. In the aorta the blood was also very thick, but in moderate quantity: the pulmonary veins were nearly empty. These phenomena were not observed in all cases, since in the majority the blood was only thickened and not coagulated; and the cause of this difference,” observes the reporter, “was according to the greater or less degree of power of the malignant ferment.” In the month of April, pestilential disease broke out at Tunis: in the May following, Malaga was attacked by it; and in August, the island of Cerdena suffered greatly from its violence. A.D. 1706, a comet was visible, and thunderstorms were experienced in many parts of England. The next year an eruption of Vesuvius occurred, and an island, five miles round, rose from the bottom of the sea in the Archipelago: