SEA ENCROACHMENTS.

Westport Times, Volume V, Issue 839, 20 July 1871, Page 2

SEA ENCROACHMENTS.

Since Monday the sea has continned to make serious inroad upon the beach near Palinerston-street. On Tuesday a stable, adjoining the property of Mr M'lntosh, and belonging to Mr Drysdale, the packer, bad to be removed. In Gladstone-street and Molesworth-street there has also been further encroachment; the Nelson Hotel is now seriously undermined, and Mr Cass's property has only been maintained by replacing daily the piles necessary to its support. The proprietor of the Nelson Hotel, by means of sand-bags, has partially succeeded hitherto in arresting the work of destruction. Amid the gloom which thin terrible devastation of property has cast upon Westport, there have not been wanting incidents of a comic character in connection with the hasty demolition and removal of buildings. North Gladst me-street and the vicinity immediately endangered are daily and nightly, visited at highwater, by numbers for the purpose of witnessing the extent of the ravages and to assist in lending a hand towards the removal of property. This amusement, however exhilarating, is attended with no little risk from the sudden rush of periodical breakers which, curling over the high line of beach, bound with prodigious force and velocity over the lower ground discharging themselves in the hollows and lowlying portions of the adjacent streets; and, as may be well supposed, victims to immoderate curiosity are not rare nor do they meet with the slightest sympathy. We heard of one sober elder of the church—holding no less an office than that of churchwarden—being suddenly immersed or rather buried to the armpits in a dismantled closet, from which he emerged a sadder if not wiser man, his misfortune serving only to excite the most extravagant merriment.

At the Nelson Hotel, which, during the present weather, is liable at any moment to be converted into a complete wreck by the angry surf, dancing nightly continues, the danger from the approaching element appearing to add a zest to the giddy votaries of the dance. Occasionally a huge breaker hurls its waters against the establish, ment forcing its way, with diminished strength and volume, into the very body of the hall. The occurrence of so striking an incident would ordinarily suffice to rout musicians, dancers, and all the giddy throng, but due preparation is made for such extraordinary contingencies. Two men armed with brooms sweep out the water, aud a little sawlust distributed over the floor suffices the not very fastidious taste ot those who nightly gather at the seen 9 of revelry. The music strikes up anew and the dancing continues until interrupted by a fresh eruption. The history of Rome tells us that during the fire that destroyed that capital and whilst the flames were raging, Nero, its emperor, sang a poem of his own composition on the destruction of Troy. History, in a very humble way certainly, is reproducing itself at Westport—scenes of excess and folly being enacted side by side with wide-spread destruction.