The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1877-01-25

"'oO manly years OclOIc INC dlllCtee
districts will be able to recover
from its effects, and it ought to be s
landmark in the history of even thi;
country of great calamities. The swift
ness of the catastrophe must have beer
terrible, and one may almost gather
from Sir Richards minute that the
great waves literally flashed out over
the land, and that simultaneously the
vast destruction of life was completed.
On the evening of the event there were
no extraordinary portents of the APP
proach of the storm. The weather had
been little windy, hazy and hot, but
there was nothing to excite the suspi-
cions of the hundreds of thousands who
were shortly afterward swept into eter-
nifty, and, to use the Lieutenant-GOv-
ernor's words, "a million or therea-
bouts of souls retired to rest apprehend-
ing nothing" At IL o'clock the wind
freshened, but there was nothing unus-
ual in that circumstance, and the sleep
ers slept on. Suddenly, about mid
night, the glitter in the starlight of
A MIGHTY WAVE WAS SEEN,
and the next instant houses and lands
were engulfed, and masses of human
beings and debris were swept away on
top Of the flood. When the sun rose
next morning, it shone upon desolate
country and shivering, terror-stricken
band of survivors, who were + OF yet
able to realize what kind of calamity it
was that had overwhelmed them so
suddenly and mysteriously in the dark
ness. Many had been snatched from
imminent death in wonderful ways !;
some had been able instinctively to
catch hold OF friendly piece of wood
floating past them, and many had been
swept into trees where they were held
tightly by the thorns and the branches
until the waters had subsidized. Villagers
were astonished with the appearance of
the corpses of strangers in the midst Of
their villages, and it was not until the
extent of the calamity became widely
known that it was found there were few
homesteads or villages that had not had
dead bodies washed into them from a
distance. One of the most striking il
Illustrations of the terrible swiftness of
the storm is given by Sir Richard Tenn
pie in his story about the escape of the
inspecting Postmaster at Noacolly. Mr..
Higgins, on the fatal night of the 31st
of October, was in his travelling barge,
in creek near Noacolly, and about 10
miles from the River Megna. He had
gone to bed at IL o'clock without any
fear or anxiety whatever. His boatman
had gone on shore, but four native serv-
ants were with him on board. Shortly
before midnight he was awakened by a
cry of
"THE WATERS ARE UPi"
Jumping up he looked out and saw
a high wave with its crest and top
cleaning in the starlight; it seemed like
q flash; in an instant his boats seemed
to rise up on high; he fastened on life
belt in few moments; another wave
came rolling on, and the barge cap
sized; he padded about in the water all
the rest of the night with the help of
the life-belt; the native servants chung
to spars. The water felt warm to the
body but the air was bitterly cold to the
face or hands above the surface. Mr..
Higgins was not the only person who
must have prayed throughout that ter
rible night of darkness for the reap
pearance of the sun; for the poor
wretches who had chung to branches or
spars narrowly escaped losing from cold
the life which good fortune had snatch
ed from the jaws of the seething waters.
One native, says Richard Temple, was
seen to relax his hold on branch from
cold and numbness, and to sink into the
flood. Doubtless many others succumb-
ed to a similar fate.
WHAT WILL FOLLOW.
The task before the Lieutenant-Gov-
ernor and his officers, of having to al
leviate the sufferings Of the survivors
in the food-swept districts, and of tax
ing such sanitary measures as will keep
down disease, is one full of anxiety, not
only because of its magnitude, but also
because of the difficulty tina. exists in
communicating with the afflicted parts
of the Delta in consequence of the
wholesale destruction of the floods of
roads, bridges, and boats. The diff
Guilty in moving about will, unless the
greatest energy is shown by the Bengal
executive, prove an invaluable ally to
the production of epidemic diseases.
There must be dead bodies ly-
ing rotting in the sun all over
the immense tract of country
that has been submerged, and well may
Sir Richard Temple say that sickness
and pestilence are now the calamities
which are to be feared. While steam
ing up a creek toward Dowlutkham, q
town which had been swept right away,
together with 1900 of its 5000 inhab-
itants, he found the banks strewn with
human bodies, floated up and down by
the tide. "Some tanks and swamps
indeed are full of human corpses and
dead cattle and all manner Of fetid
matter, and can not be approached"
moreover mary of the drinking wells
were found to be choked with dead
bodies. We shall look with anx-
iety to the health reports from the
Gauges Delta. At present it seems to
us that nothing short of a marvel will
save that unfortunate district from be-
ing visited with pestilence scarcely
less formidable than the swift and ter
rible storm-wave. Sir Richard Tenn
pies instructions to his officers are use
full as we'll as obvious enough to any
man who knows his duty; but we wish
he had said something in them about
IL Il Al = &,