The Forrest City times., 1901-12-20
PERSONAL AND GENERAL.


 The fourstory apartment building. known as the Olinger flats, at the cor ner of Indiana avenue anu Thirty fifth street, Chicago, was burned at an early hour on the 18th. The Go tenants, most of whom were asleep, were aroused by the dense smoke, and many narrow escapes from death were spectacular and exciting. Much suffering was caused by exposure to the intense cold in scant attire.
 A wreck occurred on the Great Northern railway, near Essex, in the Rocky mountains. at two o'clock, on the morning of the 18th. in which eight persons were killed. The engine, mail car and smoker remained on the track, but all the others were de- railed. Some cars were overturned and all were more or less wrecked. The accident was due To rails spread ing.
 The house of Thomas B. South worth, of Ovid, Mich, was destroyed by fire early on the morning of the 18th, and Mrs. Southworth was burned to death. She had risen to build the kitchen fire. and, being 75 years old and nearly blind, it is sup posed she set her clothes ablaze.
 In 24 hours, ending on the 10th, the temperature at Lima, O., dropped from 56 above zero to $ below.
 Third Clerk Mark Amerberg, of the steamer Spread Eagle, one of the Leyhe fleet, of St. Louis, with winter quarters at Paducah, Ky, was drown ed, on the 15th, by breaking through the ice. The remains were shipped to his home at Grafton, III. Two days of heavy rains, which melted the snow in the mountains. caused almost unprecedented floods in the rivers and creeks of PennSyl- vania, on the 18th. with great result ant damages to railroaus and other property.
 A dispatch received at Durban Natal, from Nkandhla, Zululand, dat ed December ,, and delayed in tran sit by the censor. tells of recent action near Luneberg, Transvaal, in which Commandant Louis Botha was shot through the left leg below the knee. He only escaped by crawling into the brush.
 Officers of the German cruiser Nineta, now at Norfolk. Va. say that Germany will. if the debt of 100. .000.- GOO marks alleged to be due Germany by Venezuela, be not paid, seize q Venezuelan port.
 Castro, the adventurer president nt Venezuela, has a government yacht ready, in which he can leave the country in case of emergency. He is said to have $30O,00 on deposit in one of the financial institutions of Paris.
 An earthquake which lasted 65 sec ondS and extended over very wide area occurred at Manila and vicinity on the morning of the 18th. People rushed from the churches. hotels and houses, many of them falling on their knees and praying in the streets. Quite number were injured.
 What was thought by the people of Fort Scott, kas.. to be an earthauake about one o'clock on the morning of the 18th, proved to have been the ex- plosion of a car of powder at lola, kas., nearly forty miles west. The coneussion shook buildings andawak- ened many households.
 The 12year-old stepdaughter of Mrs. Jane Farr, of Taylorville. ILL. died, on the night of the l4th, as the result of butcher-knife wound in flicted by the woman. Great excite. ment existed over the tragedy.
 Jefferson City, Tenn, has been flood ed with unsigned SEQ Montana bank notes, and on the person of a man ar. rested, on the 18th, there was found S5,0O0 of the stolen bills, proceeds O, Great Northern train robbery. A second arrest was also made, and the prisoners taken to Knoxville
 The noted murderer, William La. nier, who killed the Riddle boys on the Monroe county (Miss.) prairie in August of last year, again effected his escape from jail at Aberdeen early on the morning of the 18th. by saw. ing the bars and digging through two-foot wall.
 Senator Lodge, on the 10th. intro- duced bill to prohibit the sale of firearms, opium and intoxicating lio- uors to the natives of islands in the Pacific ocean.