Accidents > Awful phenomena of nature -- snow storms, third of March and twenty-third April, 1827

1U
At ft little distance from the church, stood the
house of Joseph lioccia} a man of about fifty,
who with his son James, a lad of fifteen, had, like
his neighbours, got upon the roof of his house,
nt order to lessen the weight of it, and thereby
prevent kg destruction.
la the Meantime, die clergyman, who lived
in the neighbourhood, and was about leaving
home, in order to repair to the church, and
gather the people together to hear prayers, per¬
ceiving a noise towards the top of the mountains,
descried two valancas driving headlong towards
the village; wherefore, raising his voice, he gave
Joseph notice instantly to come down from the
roof, to avoid the impending danger; and then
immediately retreated himself into his own house.
Joseph Koccia immediately came off the roof
at the priest’s notice, and with his son fled as
hard as he could towards the church. He had
scarce advauced forty steps, when hearing his
son fall just at his heels, he turned about to as¬
sist him, and taking him up, saw the spot on
which his house, his stable, and those of some of
his neighbours stood, converted into a huge heap
of snow, without the least sign of either wails or
roofs.
Such was his agony at this sight, and at the
thoughts of having lost, in an instant, his wife,
his sister, his family, and all the little he had
saved, that he lost his senses, swooned away,
aud tumbled upon the snow. His son now helped
him, and, coining to himself a little, he made a
shift to get to a friend’s house at the distance of
a hundred feet from the spot where he fell. *