THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. SATURDAY, JUNE 22, 1907. EARTHQUAKE MOVEMENTS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXX, Issue 8469, 22 June 1907, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. SATURDAY, JUNE 22, 1907. EARTHQUAKE MOVEMENTS.

There is no disguising the special interest which all New Zealanders take in seismic phenomena of all kinds or the sypmathy with which they watch the great earthquake movements and volcanic outbbreaks in other parts of the world. The recurrence of shock at Kingston, Jamaica, therefore, naturally attracts attention, particularly in view of the great catastrophe which accompanied that which preceded it. But it should be remembered that Jamaica and much of the rest of the West Indies are in one of the most disturbed districts of the globe, being situated on a portion of the earth's crust which for some reason or other is giving- way. Geologically the whole region between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic northward from the Venezuelan coast is sinking, and if the movement 'continues for a few thousand years longer an unbroken sheet of water will stretch from Central America to Africa. This tremendous creasing inwards of the earth's crust, which is presumably compensated for by an upheaval of land somewhere else, is necessarily accompanied by every symptom of geological disturbance. Thus it has been in that part of the world from the landing of Columbus; the traditions of the natives only add to the antiquity of its earthquake and volcanic experience; and, since Columbus, its seismic tragedies have been among the most frequent known in any of the disturbed regions from Pole to Pole. New Zealand, it may be remarked, is not among the sinking lands any more than is the opposing coast of South America. Geological processes which take many thousands of years to complete do not greatly affect national history in any case, and it is not the apparent doom of the fertile Antilles which excites our sympathy, but the present suffering and loss endured by those who live there now and are of our common humanity.