The Great Galveston Disaster, Containing a Full and Thrilling Account of the Most Appalling Calamity of Modern Times Page: 337

HAVOC MADE BY THE ANGRY STORM. 337
all the work that has bee;. done. The quickest and best cway
would doubtless be by fire, but the very mention of fire has a
terror for Galvestonians now. The city is practically without protection
from fire, and if the flames once get a good start, a holocaust
might be the result, which would be only second in horror
to the hurricane.
The problem is all the more serious because the danger of aln
epidemic caused by the many dead bodies of men and animals is
still great. Sickness of a malarial type is already prevalent. The
debris and garbage is being removed with the aid of 250 wagons
to places where it cal safely be burned, but-that is a very slow
process. Men are still being impressed for the work under the
oversight of the soldiers, but hereafter all the laborers will be paid
$I.50 a day out of the relief funds.
ABOUT 17,000 PEOPLE RECEIVING RELIEF.
Health Officer Wilkinson stated that 40 per cent. of the debris
of every description had been removed from the streets; that 95
per cent. of the dead bodies had been disposed of, and that 95 per
cent. of the carcasses of animals had been removed from the city.
Among the bodies found was that of Major W. T. Levy,
United States emigrant inspector for Galveston. His wife and
three children perished, but their bodies have not been recovered.
In one place the body of a mother was found with a babe of a few
months tightly clasped to her breast.
About I7,000 people are now receiving relief each day, and
the supplies are sufficient for their immediate wants. This morning
the first supplies brought by the Chicago relief train arrived
here by way of Clinton. The train reached Houston at midnight
Saturday, having made a run of 270 miles from Fort Worth at an
average speed of thirty-seven miles an hour. Owing to a change
in its schedule the people who had been watching for its arrival
failed to see it, and it was rushed over the Southern Pacific Road
to Clinton, where barges were waiting for the supplies.
The Chicago train was the largest that has yet been sent to
Galveston, and many expressions of gratitude to Chicago are heard
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