A FOREST ON FIRE: THRILLING INCIDENT.

Colonist, Volume IV, Issue 354, 15 March 1861, Page 6 (Supplement)

A FOREST ON FIRE: THRILLING INCIDENT.

A friend just arrived from Santa Fe states, that four Mexican herders were driving a herd of cattle through the mountains north of that place, a short time since, when the following incident occurred, which I give as I received it:—

The mountains were on fire at the time, but thinking the way clear before them, they proceeded up a narrow valley until they found their way barred by an impenetrable \yall of fire; in alarm they hastily retraced their steps, in the vain hope that escape might still be possible. But, alas! they were too late; fire had closed the avenue by which they had entered the valley, and a broad belt of f&me encircled them on every side, the area of which was rapidly diminishing every moment. The long drought had rendered the rubbish and undergrowth below as dry as tinder, and the flames licked them up with fearful rapidity, and springing upward caught the pine leaves above glossy with rosin, and then, leaping from tree to tree, formed a billow of fire awful to behold. The affrighted herd, bellowing with fear, dashed through the flames, most of them escaping badly burned, but some perished. Two of the herders attempted to follow them; but who can breathe in such an atmosphere, walk on burning coals enveloped in flames, and live?

A few steps only were taken when their nerves became contracted with the intense heat,!their limbs refused to perform their office, and they shrunk shrieking on a bed of fire, never more to rise. Their comrades heard the dying groans of their companions, and the wild bellowing of the herd, as they dashed through the sea of fire, and the roaring and crackling of the flames, as they came surging onward, and, maddened by despair, they dashed wildly from side to side, eagerly seeking that which they dare not hope to find, and already suffering in anticipation the agonies of a death too fearful to think of, when a huge rock barred their way, and they saw with a thrill of joy that a small spring of water gushed out at its foot. Hope revived within them at the sight, and with an energy such an emergency could only inspire, they improved the few remaining moments ere the flames should reach them in preparing to resist them. Everything combustible was removed, until the increasing heat forced them to desist; then inserting some dry branches into the crevices of the rock above the spring, they saturated their blankets with water and spread them out upon them, and seating themselves under their shelter, continued to apply the water as fast as the scanty supply admitted.

Ashes, coals, and burning branches fell thickly around them, and their hopes fluctuated rapidly between hope aad despair, as their chances of escape increased or lessened. Moments seemed lengthened into hours, and doubtless more than the agonies of death were passed by those poor herders ere hope ripened into certainty, and they knew they were indeed saved as •' brands from the burning."— St. Louis Democrat. Horrible Murders and Suicides in China.—The accounts of the terror with which the Chinese population is struck at the advance of the allies, of the manner in which women and children are put to death, and of the frightful suicides committed, are most painful. A correspondent of the ' Moniteur' says that, in the room in which he was sleeping on the night of the 11th of August, at Pehtang, there were five women on the bed when he first entered the place, all in the agonies of death; four had been poisoned, while the fifth had cut her own throat with a piece of broken china. In the midst of these unfortunate creatures sat the master of the house on his heels ; he was under the influence of opium, ana regarded the scene around him with the smile yof an idiot. Another person was employed in trying to drown a girl and boy, five or six years of age, in a pan of water. The little creatures were saved, but the writer says that they did not utter a cry, and seemed to have already consented to the fatal law which condemned them to death. In other houses corpses were found under pieces of furniture, in boxes, and in great earthenware jars used to stow water; most were supposed to have been suicides, and the majority were women and children. This latter portion of the above statement is supported by another correspondent whose letter appears in the ' Moniteur de 1' Armee.' He says that these jars are generally about a yard and a half high, and that a hundred such were found in Pehtang, containing the bodies of women. The inhabitants of the place, it seemed, had thus put to death all the females who, not being able to suport a long march, would otherwise have lallen into the hands of the enemy. The same writer says that when the French entered the large fort they saw a mandarin surrounded by a detachment of Chinese infantry. He exhibited much animation, and tried to induce the men to renew the combat, but failing in his endeavours, he deliberately took his sword in his two hands by the hilt and the point, and cut his throat in a fearful manner with the back of the weapon, which was toothed like a saw. This he did three times without flinching, and fell dead at the feet of the soldiers. These instances of horror and of stoicism seem contradictory, and so does the fact that while the inhabitants thus commit suicide at the approach of their conquerors, and are unassured by any amount of kindness and^ sympathy, the next morning the camp is thronged with the vendors of all kinds of^commodities, who seem perfectly at their ease. Lokning at all these facts, the killing of the women and the suicide of the men seem to arise not so much fro-n cowardice or terror of the barbarians as from deep-rooted though strange notions of honor.

The Paris papers direct attention to our Mediterranean fortresses, and one journal, speaking of Gibraltar, says:—"Batteries have been constructed in great numbers on all points, and the old cannon are replaced by Armstrong guns. The town has received an immense store both of provisions and ammunition. These military preparations, be it noted, are in conformity with those now going on at Malta and Corfu."

Bachelors and Married Men.—Dr. Casper, of Berlin, has calculated that the mortality among bachelors from the age of thirty to fortyfive years, is 27 per cent., whilst among married men of the same age it is only 18 per cent. For forty-one bachelors who attain the age of forty five years, there are 'seventy-eight married men who attain that age, The advantage in tavour of married life is shown to be still more striking in persons of advanced age.