The Savannah morning news., 1902-03-02
NEW YORK TOPICS.
DRIFTS AND UNDERGRADUATES OF
THE METROPOLIS.

Rule of Three in Park Avenue Dis
nsters-How Society SwelIs Helped
Fire Fighters-SOme QestiOns for
of Our HOaxes Originate-views
of the street.
New York, Feb. 2s.-One of the most
important now to think of is
the Park Avenue Hotel disaster. In
a former letter 1 called attention TO
the fact that only tangible results of
neglect could stir the torpid conscious
ness to the necessity of precautions.
The Park Avenue district, being the
scene of three catastrophes in less than
two months, ought to be in a fair way
to learn its lesson. The Park Avenue
railroad smash was the first chapter:
the Park Avenue rapid transit tunnel
explosion was the second; now we have
third dreadful object lesson in the
Park Avenue Hotel horror. By way of
averting public wrath the proprietor
and his friends assert that the fire was
not the result of the Seventy-first Reg
iment Armory confiagration, across the
street but was of incendiary origin and
allege that barrel of oil was found
at the foot of the elevator shaft, where
the fire started. Aside from the i'm
probability of an incendiary using Il
barrel of oil for his purposes, it does
not appear that the origin of the fire
has any bearing on the commonest safe
guards throughout the building No
nose, no neutrality-suspicious., no fire.
escapes, no ropes even. The proprietor
thought his hotel was fire-proof The
Building Department thought so, too.
They happened to be mistaken and
the responsibility for the deaths of
eighteen helpless people lies between
them.
In one of the victims the city of New
York has suffered an irreparable loss.
Mrs. R. S. Foster, the "Tombs Angel"
had done more to reclaim erring and
criminal girls than any other woman
IN the country. This was her life-work
to 1t she gave her whole time and
thought, and most of her fortune The
Police courts were her field of labor
Every policeman in New York knew
and respected her; most of the minor
criminals knew and loved her. When
the news of her death reached the city
prisons there was an outbreak of grief
that astonished the jailors, though
they themselves sympathized with it,
one incident of the fire l have not
seen recorded in any of ,the papers.
One truck hurrying to the place was
stalled in one of the snoW-blocked
side-streets nearby, in front of The
house of fashionable woman, where
a dinner-party, followed by bridge
whist, was just breaking up. A dozen
of the city's "gided youth" Sailed
forth Just in time to see the outfit
come to halt, Instantly they rushed
back, seized upon all the shoXels in
the house-snow shovels, furnace
shovels, even little stove shovels-
threw off overcoats and evening coats
and attacked the drifts. In five min
utes they had liberated the stalled
truck. Meanwhile the hostess had
filled and tightly corked two large
bottles. IVading through the snow
she put them into the hands of one of
the firemen. It's a hard night" she
said. You may need something be-
fore it's over" Then the truck rolled
on, and as it turned the corner the
capteined funnelled his hands and
shouted back an unfinished sentence
to the shirt-sleeved guests on the front
stoop: IF any of you gentlemen ever
want a iOh-''