The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1878-09-26
The Scourge at Memphis-N0t . Laugh.
Ing Matter.

lACAus Ssuu uCAAu0 eAO ACVuy VIII.
ows and orphans, and hungry,
unemployed laborers, who clamor
for the food doled out to them day
by day. the charity, not of Memphis
people, who enjoy Boston and laugh
over the press reports, but, thank God!
of millions who never met any Mem
phians, but who are moved BY the
plain, simple, unvarnished statements
of Mr.. Catron, who, to our knowledge,
has always been under rather than over
the mark. Memphis people visiting
Boston may laugh, but we, who are
here, are daily, hourly, in tears for the
manly men and sanity women, many
of whom might have fled, but who pre-
ferred to share the fate of their hum
bier fellow-citizens, and have fallen in
the cause of humanity. But there
must be some mistake about it. Sure
ly there is not one of all the thousands
of Memphians who are safe from the
pestilence that takes its hundreds per
day or more, who would laugh over the
reports, even though they were exag-
gerated, which they are not. Surely
there is not one Sc lost to shame, to the
commonest decency, as to laugh while
all the world is serious over our sor-
row, and the open hand of charity
ministers to our wants from all parts
of the earth. To lose over 1900 men,
women and children in twenty
of $4,000, white and black, and to
be expanding over 100000 for
1900 nurses and forty doctors, and
for medicines and food for more
than 5000 sick and 10000 INDECENT, is
to us sad reality, enough to move
even a stone to tears. But, beside
this, there come the tales of individual
sorrow; of whole families swept away
in a week, leaving not even one of the
name; of nurses dying at their posts, of
priests and ministers, and good sisters
following those they succored so fast
as to appal the stoutcst heart, and
"give us pause'' amid the general
wreck and ruin. No pen can do these
scenes and sights justice; no tongue
exaggerate them. Lisping childhood,
hoary and venerable old age, the va
grant and the merchant, the man of
God and the unbeliever, all are taken,
all claimed alike by the awful pesti-
lencc. 1t thins all ranks, and brings
sorrow to the mansion, the cottage and
the cabin. The cry of the fatherless is
heard every hour, claiming the pity.
the sympathy and the tears Of the most
hardened veteran. In this office, as we
write. there are but two left IF all who
month ago were employed in the edi-
torial, counting and composing rooms.
and our pressmar is down with the
fever. Strangers to the Office, as to
the business, are attending to our af-
fairs while the only editor left on
duty alternates, through sixteen
hours a day, between his desk
and a case. This is our personal
measure of the dreadful epidemic,
and surely it is sad one. 1t has
moved us to tears many time the past
ten days, although we are not used to
the melting mood. Our experience is
one we will never forget, and it is q
common one. The fifth epidemic we
have passed through, this surpasses
Parents have deserted children, and
children parents, husbands their wives;
but not one wife husband. Men have
dropped dead on the streets, while
others have died neglected, only to be
discovered by the death-spreading gases
from their bodies. Little children,
clamoring for the food she could NO
longer give, have appealed to the dead
mother, who gave up her spirit as she
gave birth to her last, in an agony OF
the fever. Ministers of the Gospel,
carrying messages of peace, hurrying
from house to house, have had their
weary feet arrested and their work
stayed by the pestilence, that walks in
the MONDAY as at night. The priest
administering the extreme JUNCTION, and
the bride of Christ, wiping the death.
damp from the forehead of those whose
friends and kinfolk are far away, are
almost paralyzed in the sacred act,
and die even before we know they
are sick. The business of the hour
is the succor of the sick, the
burial of the dead and the care oi
the needy living. The last words OF
those who are well are at night fare
wells to the dead, and the first in the
morning, "Who lives and who has
died?' All day, and every hour of the
day, this question is repeated, and the
heart sickens at the report, and the soul
grows weary over the repetition. And
yet there is no relief nor any release.
Worse and worse the epidemic has
grown, until to-day it has capped the
climax, and the hearts of the brave
men who have stood in the breach are
blanched with fear, with a dread that
humiliation awaits us, and that we are
destined to be blotted from the earth.
Fear sits on every face and dread on
every heart. We work, not in the
shadow, but in the very face of death.
We meet him on every hand and at ev-
cry moment in the names of his victims
and in the desolation he has spread
about us. Hope we have none. We
despair of any relief, but we are nerved
for the end. We pray blessings upon
the generous who have helped US in all
the States; we pray for the safety of
those who have come among us to
nurse the sick and minister to the dy-
ing, and we ask that the names of the
women and the men who have laid
down their lives for us shall be handed
down forever as among the brightest
and the best of earth. Memphis Appeal.