In Search of an Unknown Race — page 78: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

68 VAN. which he then heard. And when, a second later, he felt the solid ground shaken to and fro, and rolling him from side to side as though he were the merest atom, a sickening sensation of fear took possession of him. Again that awful rumble, a thousandfold louder and deeper! As he reeled to his feet to fly—whither, he did not know—Van was thrown violently down. Before he could rise, there was a different motion— a direct upheaval—and Van mechanically clutched at the short grass as though to hold himself down. Then a third rumble came, but died away in an in- distinct muttering. The ground Jarred slightly, as though shuddering at the previous throes, and gradually Van began to realize that the earthquake had spent its force. Whether it was the cause or not of the obscuring of the sun, Van noticed that, as the face of nature regained its wonted composure, the air was filled with a fine; almost impalpable, grayish white dust, which slowly settled down and completely hid the green of grass and foliage, producing a most singular effect on the surrounding landscape. And this it was which suggested to him that a vol- canic eruption had taken place not many miles away. And what more natural to suppose than that the volcano itself was one of the mighty peaks which overtopped the province and city of Itambez ? In the tropics the recovery from almost every con- vulsion of nature is strangely sudden. Ten minutes after the last shock, the birds and ani- mals had resumed their wonted ways. Bright colored lizards from an inch to a foot in length Eomicbdooksico