Unfortunately, it has not occurred without loss of life, for the Captain of the 8.8. Weachow, Captain Fife, who gallantly, but too'carelessly, tied to save certain buildings, was caught by a falling wall, and' crushed beneath the ruins before it was possible to rescue him. He was buried in the Amoy Cemetery on Kulangsu with due honours on Saturday afternoon, Oct 4th.
Other Deaths. many Chinese, borh women and men, have And it is already known that a good perished, some from inability to get away, others from being too venturesome in searching among the debris of their houses. Several men who tried to rob were also, quite, rightly, shot when in the act of plying their nefarious work.
The "Soul of Goodness."
There is only one way of looking at the fire in the li: ht of a blessing, and that is, if it will only have burat up the germs of the plague that have filled Amoy for some years past. One remembers how the Great Plague of London was followed a few years later by the great fire, and how seldom plague has visited our shores since. So ifthe fire will give us an immunity from this fell visitant in coming years, it will be more of a blessing than a curse after all.
The Want of a Municipal Counc:
One could also wish that Amoy was governed by a Town Council, like our English towns, which could st-p in and compel the inhabitants 'n rebuildingtomake the streets wider, with more breaks in the houses, with better facilities for getting at the water in cas" of fire, and all the many other improvements that any of us can think of, that would make the place sweeter and healthier. But I suppose it is several centuries too soon to hope for such manifest improvements, and x" the streets will beas narrow as of old, and as dirty It my be but conceit, but I would like to be made Mayor of Amoy for a year, with full powers to suggest and carry oura few such improvements, and though I should of course be the most hated man in China during the time of my administration, I should at rate feel that I had not lived utterly vain, and perhaps posterity might, bless me, to make up for the hatred of one's contemporaries, After all, which is the true fame, that granted to man in his lifetime. or alter his decease? Most men would choos" the former, but methinks, the latter is the more Insting and worth trying for.
The Epidemic of Dengue Fever isabating now, but ninety per cent of the Chinese and sixty per cent of foreigners ave suid to have had it. Luckily though very sinful, it has not been fatal. The Chin-se, indeed, call it "the ping-an" sickness, meaning the fever from which you recover, as distinct from plague which is more often fatal than not, A Sad Blank has been make in our foreign circle by the death on Sept. 24th of the wife of the Rev. J. Mucgowan, She has not been stron: for years, but seemed better the last year 80, None of us were at all prepirad for the shock of her sudden illness and speedy, release. Mr. Macgowan is one of the oldest missionaries in China, having been out here 42 years, and for the past 36 years his wife has been with him a worthy helpmate ant an earnest worker. She will be greatly missed, not only in her own hom: circle, but amongst us all, as also by the Chinese Christians, especially the women, to whom she has been a lifelong, friend.
Dacoity.
In some prrts of the country districts, there is a good deal of rubbery and_ brig-adage, more particularly in the Nort River region. Here a band of over 100 desperaters, many of whom have come over from Formosa, have mide ther selves a lair among the mountains of An-Khoo, from which retreat they swoop down upon defenceless villages, and isolate ed houses and carry off all the plunder they can. They do not hesitate to attack oats going uy and down the river, so much so that even ax many as seven boats at a time have been robbed by them. They are armed with modern guns, mostly Mausers, as well as with pistols and swords in their belts, so that bands of ten or sometimes twenty of these men form a most termi able foe. The roads and rivers of that dis. trict are for the present quite unsafe, and the fear of them is paralysing traffic and business. Money cannot be sent up or down, and many rosels are becoming deserted.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.