The country has been visited by another crushing catastrophe. On Monday last (15th) the whole coast line of Iwate, Miyagi, and Aomori Prefectures, and of Rikuzen Province, a stretch of land measuring from 150 to 200 miles in length, was inundated by a tidal wave. Hundreds of houses have
of lives lost. Accurate reports are not yet been swept away and probably thousands to hand, but those already placed before the public show that the loss of life has been fearfal. Inone place called Koizumimura alone no less than 1,450 persons are said to have perished. There is unfortunately no room to doubt that the nation has to mourn a devastation almost, if not quite, equalling the terrible earthquakes in Central Japan in 1891.
The tidal wave appears to have}. burst over the coastline of the north-eastern provinces between 8 and 9 p.m, last Monday, and to have been preceded or accompanied by great seismic disturbances. The district devasted may perhaps be most clean explained to those not quite familiar wit the map of Japan by saying that it stretches from Sendai Bay on the south, to Hachinohei and the eastern head of Aomori Bay on the north. At present the information to hand covers but a small portion of this immense stretch of country, but fuller particulars will doubtless come to hand in a few days when the officials have had time to collect matter for their reports. So far the ravages may be summarised as follows:—Washigami-hama, 40 houses swept away, deaths not returned; Okachi-hama, 30 houses destroyed, 50 killed and wounded; Shizukawa town, 700 houses destroyed, 2,000 killed and wounded; Juge-hama, 30 houses destroyed, deaths not ascertained; Kuji port, 100 houses swept away, deaths not ascertained; Ozuchi, 100 houses carried away, number of deaths unknown; Otanimura, 90 houses destroyed, 400 killed; Hashikamimura 390 houses destroyed, 400 killed, 100 wounded; Koizumimura, 1,450 persons lost; and in Matsumura 600 houses destroyed, 600 killed, 250 wounded. These are some of the returns telegraphed down. Although they will doubtless be amended in a day or two, they suffice to make it clear that the country is face to face with little less than a
is that the year promises to be a dark one. national disaster, The feeling ofthe people
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.