GREAT CONFLAGRATION AT YEDDO, JAPAN.

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1231, 9 July 1872, Page 4

GREAT CONFLAGRATION AT YEDDO, JAPAN.

The Japan Herald says :— "The greatest conflagration that Yeddo— a city of fixes — has ever been subject to, broke out on the afternoon of April 3rd, at about two o'clock, in a house occupied by Izu Higno. The fire is popularly attributed to the act of an incendiary, but its origin is still enveloped in mystery. A furious gale of wind was blowing at the time, having almost the intensity of a cyclone, which caused the fire tp spread with alarming rapidity^ resisting and overcoming all attempts to extinguish it or to limit its progress. Block after block of bouses caught fire; the conflagration sped with the utmost celerity from street to street, leaping over the canals, and at length seized on whole districts, which at first, from their remoteness from the place where the fire began, had been deemed safe from the all-devouring visitation. From the first all efforts seemed futile. The fire, fanned into fury by the wind, swept all before it, until it reached the sea* All the afternoon and night the fire burnt ; the forked tongues of flame shot high into the air ; ithe smoke was blinding and the- heat intense. The district over which the fire passed is said to measure four miles long by three broad, and to involve the destruction of from 7000 to 10,000 houses. The loss of life is comparatively small, but the destruction of property is great. The Yeddo and French hotels fell a prey to the fire, bat the greater portion of the foreigners' houses on the Concession have been saved. Meetings have been held by the foreigners to subscribe funds to aid in the relief of the sufferers. The burnt district at Yeddo will be laid out in broad streets of 72ft -width for main, and 41ft for back streets. Brick buildings are to be erected, and all laborers, artisans, and dealers in building materials are forbidden from taking advantage of the late disastrous conflagration."