Unhappily misfortunes

never come

seem

vellous recuperative faculty of the Ameri- There will be much suffering and anxiety; cans was triumphantly asserting itself. for years to come Chicago must feel the Charity was erecting vast barracks for the effects of the convulsion, and some of its homeless, and had laid the foundations of millionaires may never recover it; and yet a gigantic soup-kitchen to feed the starv- we may fairly say that the worst is past, ing. "The burnt district no longer was an and that the city will tide over the ca object of interest, save as to the situation lamity. of sites for rebuilding." Men were excavating their way down to the bank vaults singly, and the inhabitants of Chicago and subterranean strong-rooms, that they are neither the only sufferers nor perhaps might find out how their credits stood, and the chief ones. Many of them have lost strike their balance-sheets. The telegraph their property, and some their lives; yet companies had opened temporary offices for taking into account the population of the pressing and practical purposes, declining place, and the swift spread of the flames, in the meantime to be bribed to gratify the loss of life has been less than might idle curiosity. "There was not much do- have been looked for. But, if report does ing in produce circles"-how suggestive not exaggerate, the "forest fires that is of unfaltering irrepressible ener- to have been destroying life and property gy! "but the commission merchants and alike on a scale of terrible magnitude. It grain dealers are busy preparing to open would seem that an extraordinarily dry on their usual scale next week." Ninety season must have parched up the prairies thousand homeless inhabitants had found and scorched the vast forests into touchbillets in the quarters which the fire had wood. What is marvellous is, that by a spared. Lumber had gone to a premium, sinister coincidence, flames should have and hundreds of temporary shanties were broken out simultaneously like an epibeing run up. Builders were being over- demic all over so wide an extent of connwhelmed with tenders of new contracts. try. We can hardly wonder that the terThe Commercial National Bank is "to be- ror-stricken people should have been ready gin building on its old site on the 12th," to attribute this promiscuous fire-raising and the proprietors of the stupendous to design, and have resorted in some inSherman House have leased new premises, stances to violence and Lynch law. To and forthwith recommence business. And add to the horror of the situation, violent meantime, and perhaps more astonishing winds prevailed; the flames, once lighted, still, to help all this forward, country roared and crackled forward, gathering debtors are volunteering to pay up prompt- volume and fierceness as they went; the ly, instead of demanding the production comparatively limited clearings were of burned vouchers of debt. It is not clasped in the terrible embrace of concenmerely the poor who are helping the poor, tric coils of fire. The tremendous heat but the suddenly impoverished rich who must have scorched far beyond where the are freely assisting with their credit and flames could penetrate. When we read their purses. Of the citizens who threw of one hundred and fifty men burned to open their doors to the 90,000 houseless death in a barn where they had taken unfortunates, there are probably few in- refuge, we can faintly figure the tortures deed who do not lose heavily in one way of mind and body in which they expired. or another, who have not grave cause for We hear of three hundred and twentyanxiety about prospects permanently five bodies buried at one place, seventychanged for the worse. All local invest-five at another, again one hundred and ments are annihilated or depreciated; pro- fifty at a third, and so on with the disvisions will necessarily rise, and the means mally monotonous catalogue. The more of employing labour and paying wages fortunate of the sufferers, hemmed in bemust be hard to come by. Chicago has tween fire and water, put out in a gale on stood nobly by itself, and the result prom-the stormy lake to drift or pull in such ises to justify the proverb, that those are helped who help themselves. The unparalleled magnitude of the disaster served to advertise it; supplies and money are pouring in as freely from all quarters as expressions of sympathy; the business connexions of the city radiate over America and Europe; it is the centre of a great system of railway communication; and it stands on the shores of an inland sea.

craft as they could lay their hands on. One boat turned up at Kincardine, Ontario, freighted with two men, a woman, and nine children, with the body of a child who had died of exhaustion." In their panic they had forgotten provisions, or more probably had been able to find none; for the two days they had been afloat they had been starving. When townships containing some four hundred

From The Pall Mall Gazette.

THE DEATH OF THE DUC D'ORLEANS. M. TROGNON'S "Life of Queen Marie Amélie gives the following account of the death of the Duc d'Orléans, written by the unhappy mother herself a few days after the event:

My Chartres, my beloved son, he whose birth made all my happiness, whose infancy and growing years were all my occupation, whose youth was my pride and my consolation, and who would, as I hoped, be the prop of my old age, no longer exists! He has been taken from us, in the midst of the completest happiness and of the happiest prospect for the future, while each day he gained in virtue, in sense, in wisdom, following the footsteps of his noble and excellent father.

from me....

buildings and large mills and granaries] tate the example of our great mercantile have been half consumed, when numer- firms. We hope they may never have to ous villages have been swept clean away, listen to a more urgent or heartrending when death has been busy even among appeal than that which comes to them those who had the lakes for a refuge, we from the Western forests and prairies. can easily guess the fate of the occupants of many a solitary forest farm, although for too obvious reasons we hear as yet little or nothing of these. With the trees coming up to their very homesteads, acting like so many trains laid for the fire to run along, what chance had they for escape? We have often heard of prairie fires whose speed outstripped that of the swiftest horse; and settlers flying with their women and children had little chance with the slower advance of the remorseless forest conflagration that was hemming them in. The Detroit Post remarks, that the destruction in these forest fires may prove equal to that sustained at Chicago. Already the reported loss of life from the country far exceeds that in the city, and from the very nature of things it is impossible we can as yet know the worst. We have terrible proof of the combustible condition of the country, and by the latest accounts there has been little lull in the fatal winds. Thus there is parched fuel ready in profusion, with fanners all ready to blow any chance spark into a widespreading calamity. Nor could these disasters have happened at a worse time. The crops for the most part had been stored, but not sold; the hard-won family supplies had been laid in for the long winter. Now the winter is upon the sufferers, and they are left with neither food nor shelter. Chicago, which would in other circumstances have freely opened its purse, is itself reduced for the moment to beg for charity, and the efforts of Chicago's wealthy neighbours to assist her may seriously diminish their power of being charitable elsewhere. With good reason we have almost unbounded faith in American generosity, and in no country has unmerited misfortune a better chance of being relieved. But, at best, the scattered fires in the forests will be apt to pale into comparative insignificance before the grand blaze of Chicago; and when there is so much crying misery at their doors, busy philanthropists may forget to go far afield to unknown villages beyond the range telegraph and railway. We do not know that we in England have been over liberal in our contributions to Chicago; the sum raised has been made up in the main by munificent subscriptions from a handful of great firms. We could wish that English households would come forward and imi

of

He was more than a son to me, he was my best friend. And God has taken him left Plombières, where the latter was to take On the 2nd, Chartres and Hélène baths. He was, after having established her there, to come back and spend a few days at Paris, before going to Saint Omer, there to take the command of a corps d'armée intended to execute great manoeuvres on the Marne, which had been the object of all his thoughts and employments for a year past. Accordingly, on the 9th, he returned from Plombières, and came to dine with us at Neuilly, fall of the elections, and talking of them with that warmth of heart and Next day my fête day- he came, contrary intellect which was apparent in all that he did. to his usual custom, with an enormous bouquet, telling me it was given in the name of the whole family. He heard. mass and breakfasted with us. He was so cheerful! He sat beside me at dinner; he got up, drank my health with much. clatter, and made the band play a particular march, in honour of me. Who would have said that this was the last time this dear child was to show me so much affection? On the 11th, he again remained to dinner, and spent the evening with us, much occupied all the time by On the 12th he his camp and the elections. arrived about four o'clock in his country suit. We conversed together about the health of Hélène which made him anxious, about Clemenabout the elections, and many other subjects, he tina's marriage which he earnestly desired, always ending with the "refrain,' """ In short, dear Majesty, we always end by agreeing upon important points." And it was very true... After dinner we took a turn in the park, he, Victoire, Clémentine, Aumale, and I. Never had he been so gay, so brilliant, so affectionate

to me.

He spoke to me of his arrangements a fragment of the true cross, and I put it into for the troops, of the time when the King was the hand of my poor child, that the saving God to go with us to Sainte Menehould, of the time might have pity on him in his passage to eterhe should spend there, of his daily occupations; nity. M. Pasquier got up and spoke in the he looked forward to giving him a representa- king's ear. Then that venerable and unfortu tion of the Battle of Valmy. I gave him my nate father, his face bathed in tears, knelt by arm, saying, "Come, dear prop of my old age, "the side of his eldest son, and, tenderly embrac and next day he was to exist no longer! We had returned to the drawing-room a little late; a great many people came. He remained talking till ten o'clock, and when going away he came to bid me good night. I gave him my hand and said, "Yon will come and see us tomorrow before leaving." He replied "Perhaps." On the 13th, at eleven o'clock, we were about to get into the carriage to go to the Tuilcries. Following the King to the red drawingroom I see Trouessart (commissioner of police) with a terrified countenance whispering to General Gourgaud, who makes a gesture of horror and goes to speak in a low voice to the King, who cries out, "Ah! my God." Then I cry out, "Something has happened to one of my children. I will know the truth; let nothing be hidden from me." The King replies, Yes, my dear, Chartres has had a fall coming here, and he has been carried into a house at Sablonville." Hearing that, I began to run like a mad woman in spite of the cries of the King and the remonstrances of M. de Chabannes, who followed me. But ny strength was not at one with my heart, and on getting as far as the farm, I was exhausted. Happily the King came up in the carriage with my sister, and I got in with them. Our carriage stopped, we got out in haste, and went into the inn, where, in a small room, on a mattress stretched upon the ground we found Chartres, who was being bled at that moment. The death-rattle had begun. "What is that?" said the King to me. I replied, My friend, that is the death-rattle. For pity's sake, let some one fetch a priest, that my poor child may not die like a dog." And I went for a moment into a little room, where I fell on my knees and asked God from my inmost soul if He wanted a victim to take me, and to spare our so dear child. Dr. Pasquier arrived soon after. I said to him: "Sir, you are a man of honour; if you think the danger imminent, I entreat you to tell me so, that my child may receive extreme unction." He hung his head, and said: Madame, it is time for this." The curé of Neuilly came in and administered the sacrament, while we were all on our knees round the pallet weeping and praying. I unloosed from my neck a small cross, containing a

ing him, cried, "Ah! if it were I instead of he."
I also drew near, and kissed him three times for
myself, for Hélène, for his children. I laid
upon his mouth the little cross, the symbol of
our redemption, and I then placed it and left it
on his heart. The whole family embraced him
by turns, then each returned to his place.
But the breathing now became irregular: it
was twice interrupted and resumed. I then
asked that the priest might return to say the
prayers for the dying. He had scarcely knelt
down and made the sign of the cross when my
dear child drew a last and deep breath, and his
beautiful, good, generous, and noble soul left
his body. The priest, at my request, said
a "De Profundis;" the king wanted to lead me
away, but I begged him to allow me to embrace
for the last time this beloved son, the object of
my deepest tenderness. I took that dear head
in my hands, I kissed his cold and discoloured
lips, I placed the little cross upon them, then
carried it away, bidding a last farewell to him
whom I loved so well, whom I loved, perhaps,
too well. The king led me into the next room:
I fell on his neck; we were unhappy together:
our irreparable loss was common to both, and I
suffered as much for him as for myself. There
was a crowd in the little room; I wept, I talked,
I was beside myself. I remembered no one but
the unhappy Marshal Gérard, the extent of
whose misfortune I then understood. At the
end of a few minutes they said that all was
ready. The body had been placed on a stretcher
covered with a white cloth. It was carried by
four men of the house, and supported by two
gendarmes. They went out by the stable gate;
there was an immense crowd outside. Two bat-
talions of the 2nd and 17th Light Cavalry, who
had but lately passed the gates of Tron with
him and stormed the brow of Mouzaïa, lined the
hedge and remained with us. We all followed
ou foot the inanimate body of this beloved son,
who a few hours before came along this road
full of health, strength, happiness, and hope to
embrace his parents now plunged into an im-
mense sorrow. Thus we carried him, and laid
him down in our dear little chapel where, four
days before, he had heard mass with the whole
family.

THOSE who err in one direction, always take care to let you know that they are quite free from error in the opposite direction. A boorish man thanks God very loudly that he is not in

sincere - nobody having ever thought of accus-
ing him even of that small and wretched ap
proach to politeness which is sometimes favoured
by insincerity.
Arthur Helps.

NUMBERS OF THE LIVING AGE WANTED. The publishers are in want of Nos. 1179 and 1180 (dated respectively Jan. 5th and Jan. 12th, 1867) of THE LIVING AGE. To subscribers, or others, who will do us the favor to send us either or both of those numbers, we will return an equivalent, either. in our publications or in cash, until our wants are supplied.