Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1874-06-03

The Calamity FOreshadowed i'm Romance.
From the Cincinnati Gazette.

From the Cincinnati Gazette.
A well worn proverb says that truth
is stranger than fiction, but fiction
sometimes strangely anticipates truth
Our telegraph columns describe the
fearful destruction of life and property
occassioned by the bursting Of a reser-
voir covering $50 acres of ground and
thirty feet deep, few miles from
fayetteville, Mass. A similar disaster
forms one of the most thrilling episodes
Of Charles Reade's novel, "Put Yourself
in His Place." Ousley dam had been
weakened by frost, and the mill owner
was advised to open the sluice of the
water pipes and relieve the pressure.
"The embankment," the novelist tells
us, "huge as it was, was not SO high by
several hundred feet as nature build s
in parallel cases, and, beside the ratr1-
raj pressure of the whole water, the
upper surface of the lake was being driv-
en- by the wind against the upper or thin
part of the embankment. The sluice
pipes were opened with vast effort, and
"the ground trembled violently, and
the water as it rushed out of the pipes,
roared like discharges of artillery" It
was thought that all danger had been
averted, but soon thin sheet of water
began to stream down over the center
OF the embankment and trickle down.
The quantity was nothing, but it alarm
ed him, the director of operations.
Having no special knowledge Of these
matters, he was driven to comparisons,
and it flashed across him that when he
was boy and used to make little mud
dams in April, they would resist the
tiny streams until it trickled over them,
and from that moment their fate was
sealed" This thought filed him with
alarm, and not without reason. A
few minutes later "the water was pour
ing over the top, still in thin sheet,
but then that sheet was gradually wild
ening The rent above kept enlarging
and deepening at a fearful rate, the
rent in the top of the embankment
spread, deepened, yawned terrifcally,
and the pent up lake plunged through,
and swept away at once the center en-
bankment, rushed, roaring and kissing
down the valley, an avalanche Of water,
whirling great trees up by the roots and
sweeping huge rocks away, and driving
them, like corks, for miles"
The Massachusetts disaster did not
occur from precisely the same circum-
stances as that imagined by the English
novelist, but it's general occasion was
the same-the inability of the walls to
resist the pressure Of the water. The
effect, however, was singularly alike,
as will be seen by the following para
graphs, quoted from large description
SO interviewer with the plot of the story
as not to be susceptible of reproduction
uuabriged:
CAT an appalling sound, that kissing
thunder, the like of which he had never
heard before, and hopes never to hear
again, Ransome spurred away at all his
speed, and warned the rest of the village
with loud, inarticulate cries; he would
not wait to speak, nor was it necessary.
At the top Of the hill he turned a mo-
ment, and looked up the valley soon
he saw lofty white wall running down
on Hatfield mill ); it struck the mill, and
left nothing visible but the roof
surrounded by white foam. Another
moment and he distinctly saw the mill
swim a yard OF two, then disappear and
leave no trace, and on came the white
wall, kissing and laundering. Ransome
uttered cry of horror, and galloped
madly forward to save what lives he
might. AS he galloped along, his mind
worked. He observed the valley wider
III places, and he hoped the flying lake
would spread and lose some of that
tremendous volume and force before
which he had seen Hatfield stone mill
go down. With this hope, he galloped
on, and reached Poma Bridge, five
miles from the reservoir. Here, to his
dismay, ne heard the kissing, thunder
ing sound as near to him as when he
halted on the hill above Damfask, but
he could see nothing, owing to turn
in the valley. Then he dashed across
the bridge. AS he crossed it, he caught
sight of the flying lake once more he
had gone over more ground, but he had
gone no further. He saw the white
wall strike Delman's farm; there was
light In one window now. He saw
the farmhouse, with it's own light,
swim bodily, then melt, and disappear
with all the poor souls in it."
The scene after the subsistence of the
water is thus portrayed:
"All landmarks we're gone; houses,
trees, hedges, all swept away; roads
covered three feet with rocks and stones,
and bricks and carcasses. The pleas
ant valley was one horrid quagmire, in
which he could take few steps, without
sticking orstumbling against some sure
sign Of destruction and death. Within
the compass of fifty yards he found a
steam boiler and its appurtenances.
They must have weighed some tons, yet
they had been driven more than a mile
and dead COW and the body of
wagon upside down-the wheels Of the
same wagon were afterward found if
teen miles from the body. Soon after
this they came under ashort sturdy oak
that had survived; and entangled in it's
close and crooked branches was some
thing white. They came nearer; it was
a dead body; some poor man Or woman
hurried from sleep to eternity. A lit
tie further they saw, at some distance,
two cottages in row, both Quilted and
emptied. An old man was alone in one,
seated on the ground floor in the deep
mud. They went to him and asked
what thew oo7111 do for him edo