Then I think that they ought to have expected an earthquake.

Well--it is not for us to judge any one, especially if they live in a
part of the world in which we have not been ourselves. But I think that
we know, and that they ought to have known, enough about earthquakes to
have been more prudent than they have been for many a year. At least we
will hope that, though they would not learn their lesson till this year,
they will learn it now, and will listen to the message which I think
Madam How has brought them, spoken in a voice of thunder, and written in
letters of flame.

And what is that?

My dear child, if the landlord of our house was in the habit of pulling
the roof down upon our heads, and putting gunpowder under the foundations
to blow us up, do you not think we should know what he meant, even though
he never spoke a word? He would be very wrong in behaving so, of course:
but one thing would be certain,--that he did not intend us to live in his
house any longer if he could help it; and was giving us, in a very rough
fashion, notice to quit. And so it seems to me that these poor Spanish
Americans have received from the Landlord of all landlords, who can do no
wrong, such a notice to quit as perhaps no people ever had before; which
says to them in unmistakable words, "You must leave this country: or
perish." And I believe that that message, like all Lady Why's messages,
is at heart a merciful and loving one; that if these Spaniards would
leave the western coast of Peru, and cross the Andes into the green
forests of the eastern side of their own land, they might not only live
free from earthquakes, but (if they would only be good and industrious)
become a great, rich, and happy nation, instead of the idle, and useless,