Novel Means Employed to Dynamite a Cafe Manila, Mar. 21.
Two Americans, Benton Nelson and L. J. Peitz, have been arrested and charged with an attempt to blow up the Manhattan Cafe with dynamite. Nelson is owner of the Cafe and Peitz is a seaman on the United States navy vessel Beaver.
The scheme was dubbed by the City Electrician, Mr. Schoendube, as the most ingenious in Manila arson annals. The mattresses in an upstairs room were first soaked in kerosene, and newspapers soaked in the liquid were strewed around. The arrangements for setting off the dynamite were carefully thought out. On the end of a cord attached to an electric Tight switch was a metal disk. To this disk were attached two wires, one leading to an electric light plug and the other to the dynamite. The wires were not connected, but the cord suspended the disk immediately over a saucer of liquid. When the cord wels broken, the disk and the two ends of the wires, would be immersed in the liquid, thus making 'a connection and exploding the Firemen reached, the place before the cord was burnt and the dynamite exploded.
Though the persons who arranged the device had apparently been out of the building three hours before the fire was noticed, they left a lighted candle on a kerosene-soaked mattress, In time the candle burnt down and lit the mattress. Fortunately, the flames from the mattress were seen through a window by a policeman, who turned in an alarm. The fireman burst through the locked doors on the lower floor and put out the fire without muck damage.
The upstairs of the place had veen undecupied for several weeks, can man and woman had been seen ere on the night before the attempt.
Nelson claims that he left the cafe according to his usual custom at about 11 ofelock the night be the fire, and then went to Angeles, Pampanga, where he stayed with friends until morning, not knowing of the fire until he "returned to Manila, Peitz says he was aboard hig ship all right, Other arrests are expected Reuter.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.