Alexandria gazette & daily advertiser. [volume] (Alexandria [Va.]) 1817-1822, 1817-09-01
ALEXANDRIA:
.NON.D.4T. SEPTEMBER I. 1917.

0cCaSipHeu Ill all parts VI '"S c"''" ~
| the deluges which have covered ii, the
mind recoiIs in horror. At what we have
| already before US, the humane heart must
sicken; aud, it is little to be doubted
that the intelligence we have yet to re-
ceive will be equally affecting. No peo-
| pie in the world half SO opulent or half SO
enlightened as the Americans, are worse
| prepared for casualties Of this kind. We
are great Trusters Why have not you
conductor to protect your house from
light ling? The cost would be but TIL
fling, and your property and the lives OF
your family may be lost by the neglect"
This I have said more than ten or TWEEN
| ty times to different individuals -" Oh
| trust there's no danger" has been UNI
FIRMLY the answer.-' That bridge will
some time or other come down under the
weight of a coach, wagon, or CART
and lives will be lost--for you may see
that the work is quite crazy, and that
the posts and timbers are rotting-,hat
the very nails are starting out Of their
: pIaces-that the buttresses are shook, and
that the abutments are Wondering a
way.n-" Oh, I trust there's no lear
| it may last good while yet" is still the
answer.-But behold the storm comes,
and the bridge is swept away-or, ii the
(, storm did not come, the bridge would tall
! in with aye or rottenness'-As to per-
| suading them to take security against the
danger, by timely effort, or prudent ex-
penditure, it is out Of the question -
| they must be bruised before they will
feel for o,hers-I might say, for them
selves. Even corporate bodies lind i. III
finitely more convenient to trust the lives
of their fellow citizens to the mischances
! Of broken bridge, than to do their duty
by rebuilding it. For more than two years
have seen the most pungent satire, IN
all shapes of ridicule and reproach, level
led in public prints against those phom ii
might concern in Georgetown, about the
/ principal bridge of that place, which has
for all that time and more too, been in SO
crazy a condition that even foOt-passen.
gers have shuddered at the thoughts OF
walking over it.-lu fact l never saw it
without thinking Of the miserable kind Of
mountain bridge which Rolla, in the
play Of pizarro, breaks down with his sin
gle hand, after he has passed over It.
But, as insensible TO the just demands OF
! the public, as cobbler's lap-stone to the
struke Of the hammer, and defended by
a comfortably thick III egument OF nou-
perception, FROM the edge of the SATIRE
they have Rugged themselves in con'forta-
bic security, aud endeavosing to apologize
to the pubic, aud to the slender whis-
perings from within their busoms. by an
occasional much ado about nothing stir
Of pieciug and patching the flooring and
railing above, left the rest to provide tor
itself in consequence of which the props,
a, il indignant at the Partially oil our
bridge -patchers. walked of without cere-
mony, leaving the laDors Of their honors
on the part above. to find their way alter
the,n. Fortunately-Q might say mira
culousiy, since it was seldom without a
load OF either carriages or foot PasseI-
gers)-the whole took its departure at a
msment when no one was on it but had
it happened but minute sooner, the ge-
Mus of Georgetown would have been pre-
pitated by the sacrifice Of fine plump
full! grown youth, who had just passed 0.
yer it when it was carried away.
| Negligence Of this kind, involving
such very serious consequences, is in all
cases criminal. but is infinitely more SO
in place, where pursy population are
perpe,uallyemployed inurging aristCcratic
pride TO ITS extreme verge, and straining
luxury to the top Of lis bent in multiple
ed ed fees, or rather gorgeous palaces,