The Sun.
London, England, 1869-11-12 00:00:00

GREAT FIRE AT W.HITSTABLE.

On Wednesday a fire occurred at Whitstable, on the
Coast of Kent. The town consists principally of a long
Iraggling street along the shore, the space nearest the sea
tsi occupied by fishermen's stores, sail lofts, and timber
'yards, and all the buildings, whether for residence or busi-
ness, are largely composed of wood, coated with pitch or
tar. An alarm was immediately raised, and telegraphic
messages were at once despatched to Canterbury and
Faversham for the fire-engines, a special messenger being
also sent off to the former place on horseback. The Whit
table fire-engine was, of course, first to arrive on the
eeene, and was without delay set to work, pumping up
ater from the sea. The engine, however, was after a
hint time thrown out of operation by the foul-
ing and choking of the hose and pumps with sand
and beach. It had, therefore, to be abandoned. The
wind, blowing strongly landwards at the time,
carried the fire from store to store, and cottage to cottage,
in spite of every endeavour to arrest its progress. The build.
inns along the sea wall for a considerable distance were
speedily in a blaze, and the flames extended to another
range of dwellings and shops laying them waste also for
some distance, until the area extended in a triangular figure
from a point at the Victoria Ina, nearest the sea, and in the
direction of the South-Eastern Railway Company's station,
towards the centre of the town, along the " sea wall." on
the one side and the Harbour-street on the other. Within
these limits the devastation was going on with such ter-
rible rapidity, as to suggest fears for the safety
if the rest of the town, or at least the old
timber part of it. At length, however, the fire
engines, which had been telegraphed for, arrived on
the scene. They soon got to work, and, notwithstand•
lag a somewhat crippling scarcity of water, that from
the sea not being available, they after a time began
very sensibly to check the fire which about eight o'clock
on Thursday morning had been extinguished so far as to
remove all apprehension as to its further spread:
The number of buildings destroyed is very nearly
as follows :—On the sea wall thirty-five stores, six-
teen cottages, three lofts, two inns (one the Victoria inn,
kept by Mr. Marsh), one forge, one ship chandlers' store
and timber yard, one auction mart, and three shoemakers
shops; in Harbour-street, four dwelling-houses and shops,
and three private dwelling-houses. It is gratifying to state
that, although there were many narrow escapes, no lives
were lost. In one instance, however, an invalid, extremely
ill, died while being removed from a burning house to a
place of safety. It is roughly estimated that the loss of
property will be at least £13,000, chiefly covered by lam
rances.

The city of Kieft, in Russia, has been visited by 9
severe outbreak of cholera, aud, by the last accounts, the
number of victims was daily increasing ; but of sixty-two
persons attacked by the disease forty-one have diekand
in some case death ensued in three hours. A special hos-
pital for cholera cases has been opened in the town.
A gentleman hearing a lady praise the eyes of a
certain minister wrote the following :
" I cannot praise the doctor's eyes,
I never saw his glance divine ;
For when he prays he shuts his eyes,
And when he preaches he shuts mine

A LOGICAL DEDUCTION.—One of Wilson's "won-
derful characters " is a Scotch doctor, who, seeing a boy
breaking windows during a riot in Edinburgh, took the
liberty of asking him for an explanation. "I am a glazier,'f
said the urchin, with extreme nonchalance, "and all these
windows will have to be mended ; that will make it good
for trade;' upon which—so says Wilson—the worthy
?actor raised his cane, and with the retort that •` he was a
(_octor," without more ado broke the little rascal's head,
. ssuring him that he did so because that would make it
good for his trade.

ESCAPE FROM THE MORMON CITY.—A Scotch
girl named Emily Jane Kane, a native of Glasgow, arrived
at New York on the 12th August, en route for Salt Lake
City, having been converted to the Mormon faith by
one of the missionary saints. In company with a number
of other emigrants, she reached Salt Lake City on the 21st
August, and was soon horrified by finding that all the saints
had several wives, and that she was expected to make the
tenth in the family of a patriarch who had already
nine. Emily had been ignorant of this feature
of her new religion ; she speedily lost her faith ;
and she made her escape to the camp of the United
States troops near the city. The kind-hearted soldiers
made up a purse for her to go to Omaha. There she dis-
posed of nearly all her clothing, and thus obtained money
enough to pay her faro to New York. Arriving there, she
was penniless ; but she had the good luck to fall into the
hands of James Thompson, the harbour-master, to whom
she told her story. He raised money for her to pay
her passage back to Glasgow, and she sailed on the 25th
ult. When she gets home again, it is to be hoped she
will use her influence to prevent other Glasgow lassies
being lured away to the New Jerusalem.
MR. BRIGHT ON PUBLIC SPEAKING.--Mr. E.
Potter, M.P., presiding at the meeting of the Carlisle
Debating Club, said that on ono occasion, at his (Mr.
Potter's) own dinner table, ho heard Mr. Bright say,
" The whole secret of effective speaking is here—of course,
if you mean to speak, you first know what you are going
to say ; and when you have resolved on that, the next
point is to speak very deliberately—every word, in fact
every syllable, should be expressed." And Mr. Bright
added, "If - a do this, and if you have matter worth
listening tb, you will be listened to, and you will acquire
a confidence and ease you won't acquire in any other way."

A very distressing accident occurred on Tuesday
at Richmond, in Yorkshire. Several of the boys of the
grammar school in that town were amusing themselves in
a disused sand-pit, when the side gave way and seven of
the boys were buried in the rubbish. Five of the boys
were got out unharmed, but the other two, who were
brothers, were less fortunate. One of them was dead when
assistance reached. and the other was severely injured.

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