The Appeal. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. ;) 1889-19??, 1902-09-20
How One Spider
CAUSED A Lass OF
!, 1000 Human Lives
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~0~S~
Trifes, and sometimes queer onea at
that. have been the cause of mary a
frightful catastrophe. A fire which was
directly responsible for the loss of ,nore
lives than any other single onf1agrsttion
originated through the vagaries of a
stray tarantula-a species of huge hairy
spider peculiar to South and Central
America. The scene was Santiago, Chile,
and grand religious festival was taking
place in the principal cathedral The
building was sea of drapery,f flooded
with every variety of illumination. Twer1-
ty thousand silver lamps were in full blaze
and the acolytes were busy lighting the
1000 tapers ON the grand altar when the
errant spider skipped into the central
aisle and alarmed woman, who
screamed. The acolytes, or some of them,
, looked around to learn the cause of the
commotion. and one Of the naked lights
they carried came in contact with the
drapery of a colossal figure Of the Vir-
gin. A few minutes later the vast cathe-
dral was raging furnace, in which were
being consumed more than 1000 persons
the elite Of Santiago society
Recently the ancient Swan hotel in
Ipswich. Eng, was destroyed by a fire
which originated through rats gnawing
lucifer matches.
The sudden appearance of hilarious
mouse among the occupants of the gall
lery of the Victoria theater Westminster.
Boxing night, 1858, started panic which
resulted in the death of fifteen people.
A nongrel cur strayed on the ST Leger
course some years ago just as the field
swept by. Seven horses came down in
heap, and of the jockeys who were
riding them five We're hurt, three seri-
ously.
/ TO win bet of twopence, little pit
lad, employed at the Ferndale colliery in
the Rhonda valley, picked the lock of his
safety lamp with an ordinary hairpin He
himself, with nearly two hundred Of his
mates, persisted in the explosion which
followed.
At Shoeburyness, fifteen years ago, ac-
cording to a computation appearing in
the New York Press, Col. Francis Lyon
invented a new kind of sensitive fuse for
big-caliber shells, and invited several
gunnery experts to be present at the trials
On the night prior to the day on which
the experiments were to be made he
locked up the fuses In shed in which
were some fowls. The chickens started
flew up and settled on the threads of the
screws of the fuses. When, next morn
ing the gunner started to fix one to q live
shell, the missile exploded, killing the
operator, the inventor and five other per.
sons. 80. e. r @.@ ..
S BurroWtng rabbits SO weakened the
foundations Of a@tan chimney at Gleek-
heaton, Yorkshire, that it fell, crushing
to death fifteen people
A Gypsy boy, son of one of a party OF
hoppickers, drank of Kentish spring
while suffering from typhoid fever. The
spring happened to be one Of several from
which Maidstone drew it's water supply,
and a terrible epidemic, causing the
deaths of scores of the Inhabitants, was
the result.
The ship Esperanza was cast away ON
the coast of Chile through a tiny fodder
Of FIVE meddling with the compasses. She
had on board ninetyzseven persons, and
all but eleven perished Among the saved
was the innocent cause of the terrible ca
tastrophe.