The Athens post. [volume] (Athens, Tenn.) 1848-1917, 1853-05-27
THE TINES ARE OUTOF JOTNTp

THE TINES ARE OUT OF JOINT"
The Savannah News heads an article elici-
ted by the late railroad and steamboat casual
ties, with the above caption, and says:
Our readers have doubtless been struck
with the extraordinary number of casualties
which have recently occurred on sea and land,
| by which human life has been sacrificed 10
an alarming extent Let it be called super
sttiOn or whatever other designation NAV be
! given to it by the scientific, who see, we be-
ieve and feel nothing that Is not reducble 10
| O. T.. d.; but superstition or not, the belief
is not the less fixed fact in the observing
mind that those things have their seasons,
and every wind will watt wall of lamen:a-
ton and a cry of distress; every air will come
freighted with tales of suffering and bereay.
ment until the unlucky hour be past, and the
stars resume their wonted peaceful positions
in the armament.
One year or. at least, portion Of the year
will be devoted to cOnhagration. So it was,
few summers since when every mail brought
the startling accounts of fire after fire. The
season when San Francisco was laid in ashes,
New York crippled, and Montreal levelled to
the ground, was fruitful of disasters by con-
migration throughout our extensive CONT
nent; and at or near the same time the popu-
lation of Savannah was in arms and patrolina
the streets and avenues of the city TO endea-
vor to arrest series of confiagrations which
batficd all their efforts, and the origin Of
which to this day has remained mystery.
Recently, the casualties have assumed ano;
ther character. Explosions and disasters, by
sea and by land, have ruled the passing hour,
and our hearts sicken with the recitals Of
suffering, and awful mortality, which result,
not in single instance from the ancient
terror of the voyagers (storm and tempest)
but from the criminal recklessness Of those
having charge of the temporal destiny of
their human freight, or from the sunken rocks
which lie in ambush in the ocean, awaiting
the approach Of the unsuspecting victim.-
Need we point to the terrible disaster on the
lakes by which numbers of unhappy emf
grants were hurried to a watery grave, or to
the yawning pit at Norwalk which was gorg-
ed with the murdered victims of heartless
and unprincipled conductor, and his weak
minded engine driver! Look at the incredible
calamity by which two hundred human souls
were sent to their final account, awakening
from their mild sleep, with the dreadful shock
of splitting on sunken rock in the broad
ocean, only to meet fate that must close
their eyes forever more, and hurry their spi-
rits to
That undiscovered country, from whose bourne
No traveller returns
These are but few of the more striking
instances which occur to the mind, and the
loss of lite here indicated, does not show q
1.-THE of what could be summed up by refer.
ence to the reports of the last few days.
And these too will have their hour and
pass away to be remembered only or princi-
pally by the bcreft; by the few, the very few,
who, out of the selfish millions that inhabit
the earth, wear in their hearts the records of
these fearful disasters.
THE OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES writer says, it may
be well to encourage tinlid people who are
reigiously or constitutionally alarmed at light
ming, to state the doctrine of chances. As
general thing the lightning does not strike
within the space of square mile, more than
once year. IL the person is a rod distant,
he is seldom if ever killed. Now there are
60,400 square rods in square mile, and If
the lightning struck rod after rod il would
take 100 years to go over it; but it smites
here and there, and that it will smite any spe-
cial rod, there is not more than one chance to
n hundred billion.
hSHIli, otueI lungs UeiIlg equal, inc cnaIce
diminishes as it regards low object, as the
difference between the square of its height,
and that of n lower; so that with person
six feet, and that of tree sixty feet, there is
but one chance out of 1864 of the person
being struck. If he will 90 close to a tree,
or in n house without rod, his danger is
proportionaly increased.
Again, objects non-conductors when dry,
become good conductors when wet. A dry
silk umbrella, if not tipped with metallic
substance, will ward off the lightning; butif
wet, not Get lightning rods for your hou-
SEES and see to it that the fastenings be much
smaller than the rods-that the rods enter the
earth, and fear not the "red artillery"
1t is well for persons who are naturally
timid to get electrified number of tines
1t renders them less electric, and therefore
less in danger. Finally, death by lightning
is the easiest Of all deaths. An electric shock
enters, we are instantly filled, and life is gone
without pang. "Ah, but the hereafter!"-
We'll, live right here, and it will be right with
you there-if it must be so.