Note 353 — Chapter IV · (continued 2)

Mémoire sur les Inondations des Rivières de l'Ardèche, p. 16. "The terrific roar, the thunder of the raging torrents proceeds principally from the stones which are rolled along in the bed of the stream. This movement is attended with such powerful attrition that, in the Southern Alps, the atmosphere of valleys where the limestone contains bitumen, has, at the time of floods, the marked bituminous smell produced by rubbing pieces of such limestone together."—Wessely, Die Oesterreichischien Alpenländer, i, p. 113. See Appendix, No. 48.