Los Angeles herald., 1906-04-26

The executioners hurried forward,
the brands were applied to the turf of
the piles, the flames blazed up beneath
their hands-when at that moment
there came a shock as if the earth were
cloven asunder, the heavens rent in
twain. A crash so loud, so fearful, so
appalling, as If the whole of Lisbon
had been shivered to its foundations,
and a shrek, or rather thousands and
thousands of human voices blended
in one wild, piercing cry of agony and
terror, seeming to burst from every
quarter at the self-same instant, and
fraught with universal woe. The build
ings around shook, as inpeled by
mighty whrlwind, though no such
sound was heard.
The earth heaved yawned, closed and
rocked again, as the billows of the
ocean We're lashed into fury. 1t was
moment of untold horror. The crowd
assembled to witness the martyrs
death, wildly shrieking on every side.
Scattered to the heaving ground, the
blazing piles lay powerless to injure,
their bonds were shivered, their guards
were fled One bound brought
Alvar to his wife and he clasped her
in his arms.
Every street and square and avenue
was choked with shattered ruins, rent
from top to bottom; houses. converts
and churches presented the most fear
full aspect of ruin; while every second
minute a new impetus seemed to be
given to the convulsed earth, causing
those that remained still perfect to rock
and rend. Huge stones, falling from
every crack, were crushing the miser-
able fugitiyes as they rushed on, seek
ing safety they knew not where. :.
None dared ask the fate of friends
none dared ask "Who lives?' in that
one scene of universal death.
On, on sped Alvar and his precious
burden! On, over the piles of ruins; on,
unhurt amidst the showers of stones,
which hurled in the air as easily as
ball cast from an infants hand, fell
back again laden with a hundred
deaths; on, amid the rocking and
yawning earth, beholding thousands
swallowed up, crushed and MANNED
worse than death itself, for they We're
left to a lingering torture-to die
thousand deaths in anticipating one;
on over the disfigured heaps of dead,
and the unrecognized masses OF what
had once been magnificent and gor-
geous buildings.
His eye was well nigh blinded with
the shaking and tottering movement of
all things animate and inanimate be"
fore him; and his path was obscured
by the sudden and awful darkness
which had changed that bright, glow
ing hue of the sunny sky into pail OF
dense and terrible blacknesS, becoming
thicker and denser with every succeed
ing minute, till darkness which might
be felt enveloped that city as with the
grim shadow of death.
His ear was deafened by the appall-
| ing sounds of human agony and ma
lures wrath; for now sounds of hun
dred waterspouts, the dull, continued
roar of subterranean thunder becoming
at times loud as the discharge of a
| thousand cannons at others resembling
| the sharp grating sound of hundreds
and hundreds of chariotS driven full
speed over set stones; and this, mingled
with the piercing shrieks of women,
| the hoarse cries and shouts of men,
and the deep, terrible groans of mental
agony and the shriller screams of in
stantaneous deaths, had usurped the
place of the previous awful stiffness,
| till every sense of those who yet sur
vived seemed distorted and maddened.
A shock, violent destructive, convul-
siVe, flung them prostrate.
A new and terrible cry added to the
universal horror.
"The sea! The SEAL
| AlVar SpranS TO ms rect, ana cllSpeu
| in each others arms, he and Almah
gazed beneath. Not a breath of wind
moved, yet the river tossed and heaved
as impelled by mighty storm-and on
it came, roaring, foaming, tumbling, az
every bound were loosed, on, on over
the land to the very heart of the de-
voted city, sweeping off hundreds in its
course and retiring with such velocity
and so far beyond it's natural banks
that vessels were left dry which had
five minutes before ridden in water
seven fathoms deep.
Again and again the phenomenon
took place; the vessels in the river al
the same instant whirled round anG
round with frightful rapidity, and
small boats dashed upwards, falling
back to disappear beneath the boom
ing waters.
AS if chained to the spot by the hor-
ror, Alvar and his wife yet gazed;