| 469 through Vermillion Co. to middle New York, when I found brother Joseph Coon, where we together baptized eight persons in eight day's labor.
We thought it advisable to hold a conference, and organize the members into a branch. The conference was called by Elder Daniel Botsford, who was chosen chairman, and Joseph Coon; clerk. The branch was called "The Middle York Branch of Vermillion County."
Levi Murdock was ordained an elder to preside over the branch, Silas Springer, a priest, Perry Fitzgerald, a teacher, and David A. Judal, a deacon. There were ten members present on the occasion.
We feel encouraged to go on in the name of Lord, and labor in the vineyard, as he shall direct. We feel that there is a great work to be done. The harvest truly is great and the laborers few. We feel our weakness and inability, and we cease not to call on the name of the Lord to grant unto us wisdom and understanding, humility, and strength of body and mind, that we may go forward in the strength of Israel's God, to combat and overthrow error, and establish the principles of eternal truth in the place thereof.
Daniel Botsford.
Joseph Coon.
EARTHQUAKES.
At Coudrie, in Perthshire, a smart shock was felt on the 14th ult. The day was calm and frosty, with sunshine. The accompanying sound was very loud. At Aberfeldy, on the same day, two shocks were felt which lasted several moments. A letter from Rome states that several slight shocks of earthquake had been felt there, but no injury had arisen. The German papers state that two more earthquakes had taken place at Ragusa on the 22nd ult.-Scottish Paper.
THE LATE EARTHQUAKE IN THE CHANNEL ISLANDS.
It is remarkable that the men working when the phenomenon happened in the mines in the island of Sark, more than 400 feet beneath the surface, neither heard any noise, nor felt the least motion of the earth around them, although the effects above ground were of a very alarming character. The person engaged in the steam mill house, observed the machinery shaking most violently, and he thought the boiler had burst, the shock being so tremendously awful. At Cherbourg the houses were much shaken and the furniture displaced, and many articles were thrown down. No personal injury, however, attended the concussion.
EARTHQUAKE IN GUERNSEY
(Abridged from the Guernsey (Eng.) Star of Dec.)
On the afternoon of Friday last, at a few minutes before four o'clock, the shock of an earthquake was felt throughout the whole of the island, of a very considerable violence. For some days previous the weather had been perfectly calm, and the temperature so mild that many persons continued sea-bathing; the only remarkable meteorological circumstances being that a luminous body, resembling a clouded moon, was seen over the island at seven o'clock on Wednesday evening, which continued visible for, ten or fifteen minutes, and that the evenings, excepting during the short appearance of the meteor, were impenetrably dark. The whole of Friday, till about three o'clock, had been fine and bright, but the sky had somewhat an unusual appearance, the clouds being singularly tinted with pale green, red, and purple. At the time when the shock was felt-seven minutes before four-the sky was partially overcast, and had a rainy appearance, the wind blowing in slight squalls from the southward and south-westward, At the time above-mentioned, a loud rumbling or undulating noise was heard in every part of the island, accompanied by one or two shocks, which, to our apprehension, had much less affinity to the concussion produced by an explosion, than to the benumbing effect created by electricity. This phenomenon, it is generally agreed, lasted about four seconds, and was evidently subterranean.
The shock, as we have already stated, was felt in all parts of the island, and everywhere appears to have produced the same effects. Persons out of doors felt the earth heave under them, in some cases so violently as to oblige them to lay hold of the nearest object for support. The banks and hedges of the fields were seen to be in motion, and in the houses the furniture and goods were rocked and shaken.-Buildings of all kinds were distinctly seen to heave and shake, as well as the pier walls, the iron railings at the south west corner of the quay, and the massive quay at St. Sampson's harbour [harbor]. The vane of the town church was violently agitated, and the bell struck twice.-Many imagine that heavy pieces of furniture were being removed over their heads, whilst many more believed that their houses were falling, and there was a general rush into the streets. So severely was the shock felt in the office of this paper, that the numerous persons employed, simultaneously, and without concert, sought safety out of doors, in the full conviction that the building was falling about their ears. We have not heard of any damage beyond
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