The New Hampshire Gazette And General Advertiser

PARIS, August 21.

Although it is not yet known for certain how many persons have perished by the earthquake and inundation, which covered the island of Formosa and part of the seas of China, yet the last advice from the ports say, that several millions of inhabitants fell victims to that dreadful calamity, which from the populousness of those countries seems not at all improbable.

LONDON, August 18.

A letter from China makes mention of an event, which happened last year, and which if the account is true, is far more dreadful than the calamities of Lisbon and Calabria. Many of the particulars circumstances are not yet known, but the following is the general relation given in the abovementioned letter. On the 22d day, 1783, the sea rose on the shores of Kiang, to an amazing height: and during the space of eight hours, covered almost the whole isle of Formosa, which is 200 miles in extent; and when the water retired, in the room of the greater part of dwellings, nothing was left but a heap of ruins, under which a large number of the inhabitants of that immensely populous isle were buried. The Emperor of China, in order to judge of the mischief occasioned by this disaster, quitted the capital and in his journey through the provinces relieved the distresses of his people, excited by the oppressions of some of the Mandarines, having stopped his ears, he revenged their wrongs by causing the heads of above 200 of those who had thus abused the power confided to them to be struck off. Paris Gazette.