Gents Mag 1760 p.521

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	Gentleman's Magazine 1760 p.521 the valley, not only by producing a much greater quantity of water than the other, but principally by the vast quantity of rubbish which it brought along with it, the whole side of the mountain, down which it rushed with inconceivable rapidity, being covered with vast heaps of stones, beds of gravel, sand,and earth, which lying loose were easily carried away with so impetuous a torrent. Such a mixture, carried with the velocity which it must necessarily acquire down a slope of a mile in length, and so steep as to make an angle of 60 degrees with the horizon, could not but make terrible havock in the valley. The channel of the brook being rocky, and its bank rising to a considerable height on each side from the place of the water of the second spout's falling into Lizza, and mixing with that of the other down to the plain, it was so far kept within pretty good bounds; but it was no sooner freed from these restraints, than it made the most dreadful devastation. Of the first field it entered, it has swept away both the soil and the gravel quite to the rock; and the second, consisting of ten or twelve acres, is entirely burried under a sand-bank of such a thickness, as never to be removed. Instead of the old channel, which did not exceed five or six feet in breadth, and one in depth, a new one is now made at least 18 or 20 yards in breadth, and one and half deep. Notwithstanding which, it overflowed its bank on each side, in such a prodigious stream, as to be able, at the distance of a quarter of a mile, to wash away a remarkably thick and strong wall; and what is more wonderful, on the other side, even where, on the smooth surface of the meadow, there seemed nothing to resist its progress, in some places, to tear up vast masses of earth, which can no where be found, so as to leave a pit of two yards and half in depth, and of 800 or 1000 yards in area. Several other pits, it is thought, were made, and afterwards filled up again with stones and sand, otherwise it is difficult to imagine how the vast quantities of stone, which composed the walls near the brook, not one of which is remaining, should have disappeared. Such was the ruin it made in the meadows and arable ground, when at full liberty to spread itself. But it was no sooner, by the inclination of the ground, reduced within more scanty limits, than it began to rage with redoubled fury. Two meadows were entirely taken away, and a bed of sand left in their place, Its course being afterward through a wood, not a tree within its reach was left standing. Two stone bridges, well built and exceedingly strong, were carried away with the torrent, and not one remnant of the materials which composed them to be found: nay, what is more strange, a causeway of prodigious breadth, supported by a most enormous bank of earth, which is remembered these hundred years, has been swept from its foundation, and its place left floated by the stream. In short, nothing which fell in its way was able to resist it; but earth, trees, hedges, stones, walls, bridges, piers and mounds were swept away, till it reached the place where the brook discharges itself into the river Cocker. Here an end was put to its fury; for though the channel of the river was far from being capacious enough to receive the whole of the water, on account of the vast level plain on each side, its overflowings did no damage, as it could only deluge to be stagnant. Happily no houses were within its reach, though one very narrowly escaped, the ground being all carried away to a considerable depth within two yards of it, where the solid rock began, on which the house was founded; and a mill escaped, only by the channel's accidentally diverting its force from it to the opposite bank, which was all torn to pieces. I endeavoured, but in vain, to get data sufficient on which to build a calculation of the quantity of water which came down; for, as it happened at midnight, neither the time of its continuance could be ascertained, nor could it be determined whether it was constant and regular or variable. A clergyman in the neighbourhood was of opinion, that all the water of Crummack, an adjacent lake of two square miles surface, and very deep, could not have done half so much harm. It is certain, indeed, from one circumstance, that it must have been very great; as the water remained the next morning, in a widow's cottage, twelve feet perpendicular above the ordinary surface of the water, and at the distance of thirty yards from the brook; and as the ground was lower on the opposite bank to the distance of fifty yards, there must have been a stream of at least 4 or 5 yards deep, and 80 or 90 in breadth; and this
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