The Washington times., 1923-09-03
''THE SADDEST SCENE
THAT EVER MAN
BEHELD"
By HERBERT KAUFMAN

Dy f1ENbEEGl KAUFMAN
Japan is wrecked, struck down by the heaviest
blow that Nature has dealt in long centuries.
We know almost nothing of what has transpired.
Radio cannot reach the seat Of disaster Gables have
snapped All communication with the islands is cut ]
off except by aeropane.
Hay estimates from Shanghai set the loss Of life
at one hundred thousand-whch perhaps means in
Yokohama and Tokyo alone-and. inform us that no
less than two hundred thousand persons there are
homeless.
Starvation threatens other millions
Farmsteads and villages throughout the affected
district have rendered no report
When final scores are added the consequences Of
this calamity will wiring the heart and purses of the
world
America must give aid prompt aid, unrecioned aid
Ours is the nearest arder and the one available
storehouse of medical supplies
What remains Of japan is resourceless to meet the
dread emergency.
War-rent poverty-stricken China rniserablv living
from hand to mouth, and day to day-without ship
png-ignorant of sanitation and modern surgical
PRACTICES helpless to assist.
impoverished Europe will do it's utmost, but the
main weight of samaritanism falls upon local charity
Jupu1rs Gaping Wound.
TyHE worst is not over.
Georgetown and London seismographs indi-
cate further shocks embracing six-hundred-
mile region.
Volcanic fury has spread even to the South Seas.
BY the time these lines in print the NEUROLOGICAL
naces under Mount Fujiyama into fresh action and
broken the earths crust in dozen new places. The
hour may be ripe for another submergence, such
the sinking of tabled Atlantis
We merely that unreasonable chaos exists
through the densest populated section of Hondo and
that Yokohama and Tokyo have practically been wiped
out of existence.
The great tidal wave of 1891 which left three hum
dred thousand persons roofless cannot begin to
pare with the present holocaust.
Thirty-tWo years ago japan just breaking
through ancient chrysalis, still land of petty in
dustries, housed in bamboo and paper ramshackles,
with occasional solid structure in the foreign
tiers of few Cities and but the tmid beginnings of
mills, arsena dock yards and factories later to
thousands Of acres and represent billions of yen.
Japan's wealth and power, her intensest develop
ment, are centered in her gaping wound.
The important FORCES and works of the country are
within, or adjacent to- the reported areas of havoc
Flood and Flame and Crashing Walls.
IMAGINE the devastation if New York, Chicago,
and Pittsburgh were similarly stricken, and visual
ze the loss sustained yonder
The main streets of Tokyo modern thoroughfares
lined with brick, stone, and skeleton steel.
Sideways had begun to pierce the capital Universe
ties schools and hospitals of the most improved design
proportional to the needs of packed and progressive
community, have lately sprung up like mushrooms.
We haven't secured the slightest details of shuddering
happenings that followed the collapse of kscrapers de-
partment stores hotels, and tunnels.
Civilization paed teegraphs licked the travail of
San Francisco and extras shrieked the doom Of Messna
But the exicons of horror and pity will alike be
haused before hearwrenched universe expresses its
commiseration to Frustrated and probably beggared
realm.
What the President Can Do.
~ ONGRESS is not in session.
X The Executive is without power to appropriate
funds, so the burden of relief falls upon pr-