477. Subterranean thunders were heard simultaneously from the Black to
the Red sea, and the earth was convulsed without intermission for the
space of six months after. In many places the air seemed to be on fire.
Towns and large tracts of ground were swallowed up in Phrygia, during
this convulsion, the particulars of which would seem incredible, were
they not corroborated by contemporary historians.
1564. The pope confirmed by a bull the decrees of the Council of Trent.
1630. HENRY BRIGGS, an English mathematician, died.
1679. Keel of the Griffin, the first vessel in the western waters, laid
6 miles west of Niagara falls, by La Salle.
1679. The invaluable library of Elias Ashmole destroyed by fire at his
chambers in London, together with his collection of coins and other
curious antiquities.
1681. Two Cameronian women hanged at Edinburgh for calling the king and
bishops "perjured, bloody men."
1699. Peace of Carlowitz concluded between Leopold I of Austria, and
Mustapha II sultan of Turkey, after fifteen years of hostility.
1721. PETER DANIEL HUET, a celebrated French critic and classical
scholar died. He was engaged twenty years in publishing an edition of
the Latin classics, which extended to 62 vols.
1730. A leaden pot containing a human heart preserved in spirits dug up
at Waverly in Surrey, England, supposed to have been there 700 years.
1733. A negro for an assault upon a white woman was burnt alive in New
Jersey.
1737. All the prisoners for debt in White Chapel jail, England, were
discharged by the executors of the will of the late Mr. Wright who paid
their debts.
1769. JOHN WHITE, printer and publisher of the _Newcastle Courant_,
died, aged 81. At his decease he was the oldest master printer in
England.
1779. ARNOLD sentenced by court martial to be reprimanded by Gen.
Washington.
1782. DE GRASSE with the French fleet, 29 sail, attacked the British
under Hood, 22 sail, but was repulsed with the loss of 1000 killed and
wounded. British loss trifling.
1787. The assembly of notables met at Paris, having been called together
to assist the king, Louis XVI, and M. Calonne, to raise a revenue to
meet the exigencies of the times. M. Calonne presented his new plan of
reform and taxation, imposing a share of the burden upon the privileged
classes: but as the assembly was composed of these classes they could
not make up their minds to impose taxes upon themselves which had
hitherto been borne by the lower classes. The assembly was called to
help the king and his minister out of a dilemma, but plunged them deeper
in trouble, and accelerated the revolution.
1793. The stadtholderate of Holland abolished, and the Batavian republic
under the protection of France established.
1793. The senate of Venice acknowledged the French republic.
1795. The French national convention declared Marseilles in a state of
siege.
1795. The assembly of the states of Holland met and chose Peter Paulus
their president for the term of fifteen days.
1814. The Russians under Blücher passed the Marne and marched upon
Troyes. Bonaparte at the same time entered Vitry.
1820. HENRY ANDREWS, a self-taught English mathematician, died. For more
than forty years he produced an almanac for a company of stationers
under the name of Francis Moore, physician, and astonished the simple
and ignorant by his marvelous predictions. His prophecies were as much
laughed at by himself as by the worshipful company of stationers for
whom he annually manufactured them in order to render their almanacs
salable among the ignorant, with whom a lucky hit covered a multitude of
blunders. A few years before his death he predicted that the people
would soon know better than to be influenced by the prophecies which his
employers required him to write. He did not live to see the publication
of the _British Almanac_, which effected the downfall of _Poor Robin_
(the title of one of his almanacs), which ceased to exist in 1828.
1823. EDWARD JENNER died, aged 74, celebrated for having introduced the
practice of vaccination as a preventative of the small pox. He was the
youngest son of a clergyman, born in England 1749. He commenced his
investigations concerning the cow pox about the year 1776, and twenty
years afterwards the practice was introduced into London hospitals. The
success of this discovery procured him honorary titles, and a grant from
parliament of £20,000.
1838. JOHN O'NEIL died at Havre de Grace, Md., distinguished for the
resistance which he made at that place, to the British under admiral
Cockburn, during the last war.
1839. STEPHEN VAN RENSSELAER died at Albany. He was born in the city of
New York 1764, and graduated at Cambridge, Mass. He was the fifth in
descent from Kilian Van Rensselaer, the original proprietor and patentee
of the colony of Rensselaerwyck, a territory 48 miles long and 24 broad.
He filled several offices, civil and military; was a man of great
wealth, and distinguished for his magnificent charities and Christian
virtues.
1839. Tremendous gale and heavy rain in the United States. The river at
Philadelphia rose 17 feet above low water mark, and at Kenebec 13 feet
above high water mark. New York and Albany were considerably flowed.
1850. FRANCIS JEFFREY, a Scottish jurist, celebrated by his long
connection with the _Edinburgh Review_, died, aged 77.
1853. SYLVESTER JUDD died, aged 40; a unitarian clergyman at Augusta,
Me., author of several works which found many admirers.