I then stated that my object was to vindicate the reputation of my uncle, and to recover also the large amount of money due from the insurance company at Surinam. I assured him that my purpose was not to bring him to justice, but only to obtain from him a solemn affidavit, retracting his former perjury, with a confession of the means by which he had been bribed to commit so foul a wrong. When I had done, the man looked at me with a mixture of amazement and mirth. The audacity of my proposition seemed at once to astonish and amuse him. After looking me steadily in the face for a few moments, he said, with great civility, “I will think of this proposition, and when I am prepared to erect a gallows and twist a halter for my own execution, I will perhaps comply with your very reasonable request.” Saying this, the man rose from his seat, saluted me with great politeness, and was about to depart. Stung with disappointment and indignation, I placed my back to the door, determined to oppose his departure. While I stood a moment in this position, facing the captain, my feet seemed jerked from under me, and I fell to the floor. At the same instant I saw that he was thrown forcibly in an opposite direction, and laid prostrate. I arose, but was instantly thrown down again. I could now perceive that the room was rocking backward and forward; at the same time, my ears were filled with the most terrific sounds I ever heard. With a powerful effort, I arose and rushed down the stairs, into the street. The earth trembled beneath my feet, and the buildings around seemed to be rushing into a mass of ruins. On every side, I could hear the crash of buildings falling to the earth; the screams of men, women, and children, filled with despair or crushed beneath the falling fragments; together with the heavy and portentous sound, like the deep bellowing of thunder, smothered in the bowels of the earth. Completely bewildered, I rushed along the street, escaping as if by miracle from the bricks and stones and timbers that fell around me. At length I reached the Plaça Mayor, where I had an extended view of the scene. The whole space was nearly covered with people; priests with their crosses; women with their children; aged men and women, tottering with years; the rich and the poor, the strong and the weak, the young and the old; some silent and some wailing; some prostrate on the earth; others kneeling and telling their beads; others standing erect, and spreading upward their beseeching hands to Heaven. While such was the spectacle before the eye, the ear was stunned with strange and appalling sounds, and at the same time, the earth trembled as if the very stones were filled with fear at the awful visitation.