The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1900-09-16
HIGHTY TIDAL WAVES.
IN. uu.dation At Galveston win Rank Among
the Most Dtsastrous.

From the 81. Louis Globe Dsrocrot.
That the coasts OF England have been visited
by many and disastrous tidal waves there Is
abundant evidence. In fact the ocean bay.
which surrounds nearly the whole OF England
and Scotland. is evidence enough that tho en-
tire shore line as It exists to-day Ia Itself the re-
sui, OF a great submersion. or series OF submer-
s,ons which ages ago overlooked the old coast,
rushed inshore, made new land lines and. hol-
lowing out between the new line and the old. a
new ocean bed. leaving what had been called
the c1as, line 10 be forever after called "the
bar" The bar is TO be found In nearly every
port Of England. eloquent testimony to the
tidal waves OF the past. But there Ia little Of
other testimony save snoh a. has boen pre-
served In the records Of seaport owns.
One Of the greatest cataclysms ever occurring
on the British coast was that on the coast Of
Ldncolnshire IN 1871. This has been
Grated In verse by Jean Ingelow In the poem
entitled High Tide on the Coast Of Lincoln
I shire" The Lincolnshire coast IL almost
uniformly low and marshy-so low, In fact, at
some plac es that the shore requires the defence
Of an embankment to save II from the en-
! croachments OF the sea. A sea wall had been
built when the great tidal wave OF 1911 came,
but il a. pear 10 have been absolutely Useless
as n defenc, Of the country and the people at
that time. At the present day tho fens Of
: Lincolnshire are defended from the North Sea
by some Of the finest engineering works In the
world, and yet It is much 20 he doubted whether
they would prove effective against such in
vasions as that which has Just overwhelmed
/ Galveston.
There are ancient town records in nearly all
the seaooast towns Of Linco nshire which tell Of
the ipundation Of 1851. Theirs was then. as
] ,kz.a,,oar N cbfpro % halla IN tks foUer Of ~
Botolph. Boston. aud when the tide was seen TO
ls swecning away tie barriers the Mavor ~
Boston himself mounted the hel'ry stairs nd
had y ayed thu old owe song called The Brides
Of Enderbv' ~ an alarm to tie countrvIlde.
Hut the tide came 40 unheral6ed. there having
, been no III emonition o. II in storm or tent ost,
stood Savants have never had an expl nation
Of the Lincolnshire" tide. corning rs II did 40 uU-
herald d by anything IN e~atsninE q cataclysm;
thousands foi victims 10 rs f.rv.
Nm Of the most fatal tidal waves OF which
We have any hi,torTE have been SG conn n bHt
making II impossible to say whether the earth
9ua%" OF the inlndation has been ne more
al Lisbon in 1855 was accompanied by a TIDAL
wave which. rolling un the Tarus River from
tho oc cH1 isn6rmoSrrosGd iS a., the lido I.W oi H i2rs T %n ine
might possibly have escaped the ca thdunke
shocks, When the earthquake came TO ca
Ia Gulyra, the cntreph, Of Caracas, which de.
s'royed miny lives. Five wears ago n series 4
tidd waves, ACCOMPANIED by or alternating
with earthquake shocks. VISITED some OF he
most p%opn'ous. islands Of Ja0an. The tidal
waves reached from fifteen 10 twenty miles in
land. being Of such heivht, force ard volume
ten mile, from the ocean, particularly when re-
stricted ~ narrow valleys. a. 10 be CAPABLE
OF destroying much life TIL number Of human
lives lost at that time has never been stated In
an English newspaper, but that II ran iar MO
the thousands There is no roo to douh'
Ten roussn1 Is more ant 70 he an under
than an over estimate. such werA the ravaves Of
the combiued seismic and cataclvsUic terrors
visited upon that mart Of thn world during
nearly q week of DAYS and nights II horror
which. fortunately. come but SELDOM in the eX
peripnc'~ Of tn race.
The affection OF Texas. while much less than
this. Is ~till tai and will always rank
among the great catastrophes Of history. Per
haNs the e have been events more destructive
: OF life. in timnso or nlR"eS whore II was impussi-
bic that any record OF Thorn should b. left. But
fow such are known TO history. Nor Il II likely
That the future will often bring to any part ~
the world n scverer af1iction than that which
has fallen upon our Gulf coast.