a solitary building
without was standing; the fourth story of the Seminary was completely
gone. Our new dwelling house was in course of erection and was nearly
completed. Although it was a large structure, thirty-six by fifty
feet, not a vestige of it remained above the cellar walls; even these
were partially overthrown. My barn, carriage-house and stable,
together with every other out-building, were nowhere to be seen. Such
a sight was never witnessed in this part of the country. The horses
were still alive, though one of them, which had been in the barn, was
gasping for life more than fifty yards from the building, and was
badly mutilated; the other appeared unhurt, having kept just outside
of the storm track. The cow, which had been grazing in the pasture
field adjoining, had been lifted up bodily by the revolving mass and
was thrown over a hedge twenty feet high, and was dead--the fall
having probably killed her. The three hogs upon the premises looked as
though they had crawled out of the earth, for they were covered with
dirt; they seemed to breathe with the greatest difficulty and one of
them soon died. About fifty chickens were lying around dead. The
beautiful lawn in front of the Seminary, containing thirty varieties
of trees and ornamental shrubbery, was badly damaged, more than half
of the trees being either twisted off or uprooted. Not a fence could
be seen anywhere. I turned away from the sad and sickening scene. The
storm had broken nearly everything; the ground in all directions was
covered with timber and with the _debris_ of buildings and of trees.

Some strange incidents occurred in connection with the destruction of
property. Three carriages within the same building had their wheels
deposited at different points of the compass, more than one hundred
yards distant from the building and from each other. The spokes and
axles were mostly gone. The buildings had been covered with tin, and
this tin roof was found in every direction at an almost equal radius
from its former location. In several instances the roofing material
was interwoven with the branches of trees, and was wound around the
same two or three times. A large apple tree had been carried more than
one hundred yards. A chestnut tree of huge dimensions in the front
lawn had been stripped of nearly all its foliage, but had not been
overthrown. Over a hundred quilts and blankets from the Seminary were
lodged in the neighboring forests, torn into sh