The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1870-10-23

~ here, written post haste in pencil on
:9t scrap Of paper, We have been furnishs
With the news of very dreadful occu
:. renee, the remembrance OF which. says Fl
= writer Zone Of our missionaries It b.
a Ghang), shall carry with me to my dyiu
day. On the 11th instant, at Ave in I'll
~ morning, sslight earthquake was felt {
at bathang; at noon . stronger one took pla<
inia nous Rn however, doing seriou
"a commotion shook the unhappy town fror
70 one end to the other. The largest house
IS well a. the smallest, the civil and mill
Ia tary tribunals, the large and splendj
d amasery (tenanted by 5000 Lamas), tt
y palaces three or four stories high) of til,
Ihibetian chieftatns, the Chinese magazine
: and arsenals-all, in the twinklings of nj
= eye, fell down with the lugubrious nois
\ peculiar to such circumstances Half O
: the population, or more than half, are deai
or dying, buried under the rubbish of faller
buildings. Immediately after, furiou,
f wind, as usual amongst us, blowing vio-
: iently, sprang up. Fire broke ont in many
: quarters OF the town simultaneously. In
desoribable confusion followed as q matter
Of course, both Thibetian and Chinese au-
: thorities, as usual in any emergency, com
pleteiy losing theirzheads. Among our
, ECnlnese mandarlns some are wounded,
= some missing. Of the two Thibetian chief
tains, one, an old man who was away from
home at the time, is still living, but utterly
unable to maintain order; the other is re-
: ported to be buried with all his family be-
meath the ruins of bis house. Of the Chi
nese garrison there survive but ten (some
say only six) soldiers.
''Thank God our three confreres have
had a very narrow escape; they, however,
succeeded in escaping in time to their little
garden; but one of their Thibetian servants,
a young man OF twenty five; has been kill
ed; two Chinese boys grievously wounded.
All the surrounding country is in the same
0lAnrnArs oil
j was stall quaking on the 18th, two days
! after the fatal accident Enormous rocky
masses are seen rolling down from the
mountains in the neighborhood; the public
| impracticable. The Thibetians, who as
might be expected are much terrified, an
nounce the end of the world, a dogma in
which they believe. We hourly await the |
detailed accounts. Our civil aud military |
authorities are very busy sending letters
to Pekin and Bathang every day. Traders,
soldiers, officials, and the common people,
all of whom have mercantile OF domestic
interests in Bathang, are extremely de-
jected. Desolation is universally spread
all over Ia Tsien- Lou, Everybody know
ing beyond all possibility of doubt, that
the once handsome little town of Bathang
is nothing else nowadays than heap of
ruins.
"As far as our poor Thibet is concerned
what shall sayf This brief sentence
auohe Diesseu " Loro, oe 1hy name Tor
ever! Lord save us, or we perish. For j
thank God for ever, the first mil !
itary officer, Colonel Ma Kay Khaug, a
had a very narrow escape,
but very happy for Bathang, perceiving !
his house shaken from top to bottom, he +
newly dug, while his tribunal fell down :
in ruins on the opposite side. Had he fed I
1t this moment, or taken no care as the
poor half-crazed civil Governor did, all
would have been over for Bathang. Honest
people could not remain in the town, pre- :.
erve their little property, nor even draw
'ut their dead and attend to the wounded.
Che brave colonel, sword in hand, followed
" some. few soldiers, runs everywhere, Ct
maintains order, drives away, numerous
hieves coming from all the country round
o plumber friends or foes, a very hideous
eature of the Thibetian and Chinese char
cter. Colonel Ma Kay Khang, in these
ainful circumstances, is worthy of the
ighest praises, and if some gentlemen of
Ugh standing and influence could recon-
lend such brave officer to the beuevo-
snce of the Chinese Government great a.
lstice would be done. From the last ac- Of
cunts received, we can conjecture that en-
ne earthquake of the II tn April has been ~
lit through $50 miles from east to south v
est, and ninety miles from north to
,uth, the centre of the commotiOn seem
g to have been in Bathang, or a little .,
lrther perhaps, near the small village of -
ung- mou-tang, SO well known to your
old countryman, Mr.. Cooper, where he =
let Sir Suggur Shere, the Nepaulese En- ~,
oy, in 1868. Besides this village many
Tiers of sofne Importance are nearly des- Th
Dyed; great fright in all quarters; con-
derable loss of life; disorder all over the Re
,untry; robbers like wild beasts, run
very where; no one dares go out alone and ,o1
ithout firearms. The Imperial highway Off
ON Pekiu to L'hassa seems, and is said to
3 now, totally impracticabe near Kong y
ze-tin by the fall of a mountain and the N
ldden upheaving of new one. Travel
g, of course, are not to be found at all,
e more SO because the ground is fire.
lently tossed to and fro like ship at sea-
i'll the evening of May 9, earthquakes. E E1s
any times a-day. NJ. Desgodins writes Il
om Yerkalo the 10Th April that, in a short Ass
terval of six days-from the 18th to the "a
experienced thirty-si shocks
ithout any very great injury to their Ger
nall houses, thank God and our Blessed Z
ady, Queen and Patroness of the little 6 y
lristian colony. Like every one in the ia
untry, missionaries are living outside of n
cir houses according to the poetical NI
shion of old, sheltered by goats skins,
more, under the sky of our
Father. Let US, then, be patient
der SO many trials, that SO we may en-
the consolation of having rendered our
vea mara available t, tho aaluot;on orJ n