The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-09-14
RELIEF WORK GOES STEADILY FORWARD
Three Hundred and Six Communities
Have Already Contributed to the
Stricken City, and Three Hun
dred Thousand Dollars
Have Been Forwarded,
and the Stream is
Swelling, But
More will be
Needed.
[By the Associated Press.)

Galveston, Texas, Sept. 13.-Galveston is
beginning slowly to recover from the stun
ming blow of last week and although the
city appears tonight to be pitilessly desc
and industrial interests are setting their
forces to work and start has at least
been made toward the resumption of busi-
ness on a moderate scale.
The presence of the troops has had
beneficial effect upon the criminal classes,
and the apprehension of a brief but des-
perate reign of anarchy now no longer
lists. The liquor saloons have at least tenn
porarily gone out of business, and every
strong-limbe man who has not his own
humble abode to look after is being press
ed into service, so that first of all the wa
ter service may be resumed, the cutters
flushed and the streets lighted
The further the ruins are dug into the
greater becomes the increase in the list
OF those who perished as their houses
'tumbled about their heads. On the lower
beach yesterday searching party found
a score of corDses within a small area,
going to show cha tho bulwark of debris
that lies straight across the island con-
cealS many more bodies than have been
accounted for.
Volunteer gangs continue their work of
hurried burial of the corpses they find on
the shores of Galveston island and many
neighboring points where fatalities at
tended the storm. 1t will probably be
many days yet, however, before all the
floating bodies have found nameless
graves.
BODIES TOSSING ON THE WAVES.
Along the beach they are constantly be-
ing washed up. Whether these are those
who were swept out into the Gulf and
drowned or are simply the return ashore
of some Of those cast into the sea to guard
against terrible pestilence, there is no
means of knowing. In any event the AS
Sociated Press correspondent, in trip
across the bay yesterday, counted seven
bodies tossing in the waves with a score
OF horses and cattle. the stencil from
which was unbearable. In various parts
of the city the smell of decomposed flesh
is still apparent. Wherever such instances
are found the authorities are freely disin-
fecting. Only today a babe lashed to a
mattress was picked up under a residence
burned.
SCENE OF WRECK AND RUIN.
The city still presents the appearance
of widespread wreck and ruin. Little has
been done to clear the streets of the terri
bic tangle of wires and the masses of
wreckage mortar, slate. stone and glass
that bestrew them Many of the side
walks are impossible. Some of them are
Uttered with debris. Others are so thick
ly covered with slime that walking on
them is out of the question. AS a gen.
eral rule substantial frame buildings
withstood better the blasts of the gale
than those of brick. In other instances,
however, small wooden structures, cis-
terms and whole sides of houses have been
pumped down in streets or back yards
squares away from where they originally
stood.
Here and there business men have al
ready put men to work to repair the dam
age done, but in the main the commercial
interests seem TO be uncertain about fol-
lowing the lead of those who apparently
show faith in the rapid rehabilitation of
the island city. The appearance of the
newspapers today after a suspension of
several days is having a good effect and
both the News and Tribune are urging
prompt succoring of the suffering and
then equal promptness in reconstruction.
1t is difficult to say yet what the ulti-
mate effect of the disaster is to be on the
city. Many people have left and some may
never return. The experience of others
still here was so frightful that not all will
remain if they can conveniently find oc-
cupation in other cities
BELIEVE THE CITY WILL RECOVER.
The bulk of the population, however, is
only temporarily panic-stricken, and there
are hosts of those who helped to make
Galveston great who look upon the catas-
trophe as involving only temporary halt
in the advancement of the city
What is most bothering business men
at present is what attitude the railroads
and especially the Southern Pacific. are to
assume with respect to reconstruction,