St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1892-01-21
JAPAN TERRIBLY SHAKEN.
Some Details of the Recent Destructive
Earthquakes in thai Empire.

oO0AO
EARTHQUAKES in that Empire.
-Corresponden of the C~ALEDoNIAN.1
Among all the catastrophes in
Japan, the earthquake of Oct. 2Sth
has proved by far the most destruc-
tive. Flood and famine, war and
pestilence have wrought great ruin
within the past thirty years,-thatis,
since the coming of the foreigners to
this land of the Rising Sun; but dur
ing this time there has been nothing
to compare with the destruction of
property and almost instantaneous
loss of life which attended this up
heaval of mother earth.
The region visited by the earth
quake was confined to the central
part of the Empire; although it was
felt pretty widely, its destructive
force was felt chiefly by three cities,
Magoya, Gifu and .Ogaki. P%roviden-
TALLY, the centre of the disturbance
seems to have been nearest the small
est place. The first shock occurred a
little before seven a. M, which also
may be considered providential, for
had it occurred during the night the
deathli list must have been four or five
timesit present size; or had it taken
place even an hour later, many more
operatives in factories must have
been crushed to death. AS it was,
the hour was so late that all the
wooden shutters enclosing verandas
were open, and on the first trem-
bling the great mass of the people
could run out of the houses before
they fell. Thus it is that while the
fallen houses number in the tens of
thousands, toward $4,000, the num-
Der of those who were caught in the
falling buildings and either crushed
to death, OF burned to death by the
fires that soon broke out, does not
aggregate 5000.
Very shortly after the most violent
shock had levelled thousands of
houses, and crushed hundreds of peo-
pie tt death in Gifu, the changing of
the fire bell was heard. In an in
credibly short space of time, the fire
spread, the unhappy people being en-
tirely occupied with the work of try
ing to rescue the wounded from the
debris. By degrees the citizens as
sembled in the open space near the
Koncho, gazing with despair on the
roaring conhagration on the one
hand, and their ruined and diving
relatives on the other. Three other
fires Immediately broke out, and ul-
tirnately joining into one, swept
from street to street, the fury of the
flames being famed by a strong wind
which began to blow at 2 p. M. 1t
is impossible to convey any idea OF
the confusion and distress that pre-
vailed at this time. BY 8 D.. m. al,
most every part of the town was
wrapped in flames. The inhabitants,
abandoning all hope of staying the
conhagration, escaped with such few
articles of furniture and clothing as
they could save. 1t had been burn
ing almost % hours, and the town
was a mass of charred ruins.
In % places the soil sank more
than three feet, the total area
of this subsistence being nearly three
acres. Fissures in the ground are
also very frequent. They vary from
one to three feet in width, and some
are fifteen feet deep. We have count.
ed yer a hundred large assures, and
the smaller ones are numberless. Ir
one place near the river there is q
subsistence of over 20 feet, through.
out an area OF 900 square feet. In
some parts of the town boiling mud
spouted out Of the assures to a height
of ten fee. Some of these geysers
were formed and the majority O
them continued spouting for one OIL
two hours. Some are still active
At the site of such phenomena the
earth is elevated, for the most part
to the height of several feet. More