The Press. — 1856-08-02 (London, England)

TERRIBLE RAILWAY ACCIDENT IN THE UNITED STATES.—On the morning of the 17th of July 1,100 children, of various ages, started from Philadelphia, with their teachers and friends, for a pic-nio on grounds near the North Pennsylvania Railway, about twelve miles from the city. There was but one line of rail, and the train, being unusually heavy, was detained beyond its time. The regular down passenger train, instead of waiting at the turn-out, pushed on at full speed, and in rounding a curve the two trains came in collision. The results were too dreadful to believe. In the whole annals of railway murders I have never read anything so frightful. The two locomotives were locked together in one undistinguishable mass. Three of the cars on the excursion train were ground to splinters, and the unhappy children crushed beneath the ruins. The next two cars were thrust forward over the ruins, and into this mass of broken iron, splintered wood, and mangled limbs and bodies, fire from the locomotive fell, igni!ing the whole. Then ensued a scene to horrible for description. The dead were charred and burnt so as to be beyond the recognition of their friends. The agonies of the dying were made more excruciating by suffocating smoke and heat, while the wounded and mangled, pinned by the firm masses which covered them, met a slow death by tire. The total number of victims by this wholesale slaughter is not yet ascertained, but it is supposed to exceed 100. No excuse is offered, as, indeed, none could be made. The guilty conductor whose recklessness caused this destruction put an end to his own life by arsenic.  A TERRIBLE EARTHQUAKE occurred on the evening of the 2nd March, on the island of Great Sangir, of the Molucca group. The volcanic mountain of the island, Awu, about 4,000 feet above the level of the sea, at the same moment burst forth in eruption, a frightful tempest set in, the earth opened on all sides, hot springs burst out, the lava poured down streaming over the country, and this frightful scene lasted for four hours. About noon the next day the mountain threw up for several hours such clouds of ashes that the snn was darkened, and the country for miles buried under the heap. On the 17th a third eruption occurred. The loss of life is estimated at nearly 3,000 persons. The majority were destroyed by the lava.  THE REFUSAL or CABS at railway stations to take fares has been alluded to this week by several correspondents of the Times. One says that sixpence to a porter will always get a cab, and charges the company with permitting a gross extortion. Another writes :—" The abuse is far from being peculiar, it prevails equally at every station in the metropolis. The proceeding described is not an isolated trick, but the universal practice of the cabs which ply at the various stations. On the arrival of a train, let any passenger make the experiment. His door is, as we will suppose, the first to be unlocked; he is next to the platform, he jumps out, and rushes, first of all his fellow-passengers, to the line of cabs on the other side ; he will receive the same refusal from all, on the plea of a previous engagement. They do not want him—they want the old lady with the bandboxes, her parrot, and all the extra luggage which entitles them to their extra charge. I have frequently met this dodge by pooh poohing their professed engagements and seating myself inside their cab; but this succeeds only if one is among the very first corners, and, even then one runs the risk of being ejected, as it is, of course, possible that the cab may have been engaged either by signal from one of the carriages, or by one of the porters at the request of a passenger."