86 The East Anglian Earthquake.
E., and at the N. corner of another shaft a single brick about
half-way up was displaced and left projecting. Mr. Wilkins
has been good enough to furnish me with the following
additional notes respecting the effects of the earthquake at
Wivenhoe :—At the house of Mr. Blois, five pictures hanging
on a wall facing S., which before the shock were parallel with
the floor, were afterwards found to form an angle of 5° with
the floor : the chimneys of this house were thrown down.
At the house of Mr. Barrett seven pictures were affected in a
similar manner, and the chimneys also dislodged. Mr.
Cuthbert (already alluded to) had one picture displaced 10°
and the house practically wrecked. Mr. Wilkins himself had
nine pictures shifted 31/2°; his chimneys were not thrown
down. Mr. Wilkins was inclined to believe that the dis-
placement of the pictures was not produced by a lateral
swinging movement, but that the nails, with the walls into
which they were driven, were lowered suddenly, and the
pictures and cords followed, so that when the wall resumed
its normal position the pictures were lifted into a fresh
position. Underlying this explanation there is, of course,
the assumption that the point of suspension of the picture
is lowered obliquely with respect to the frame. The Post-office
clock, kept true to Greenwich time, was stopped at 9.18.
One circumstance with reference to the damage at Wiven-
hoe is sufficiently interesting to be recorded here, although
the bearing of the fact in question belongs more to the
geological portion of this report. My attention was first
called to the absence of damage to the houses on each side
of the railway cutting south of the station by Mr. E. B.
Knobel, F.G.S., of Bocking, who visited the earthquake
district four days after the disturbance. This observer
wrote :—" The whole of the town seems to have suffered
from the shock, with the exception of two rows of houses,
one on each side of the railway cutting just south of the
by supposing that the house or shed at Wivenhoe was sheared through so
large an angle as to bring a line of sight through its windows to the eye
of an observer situated at the place sketched is, I must admit, to put a
severe strain on the theory as well as on the house.")