THE HORROR OF THE PEOPLE.


It was with grief and horror that the mass of the people gazed on this
steady march of the army of ruin. They were seemingly half dazed by the
magnitude of the disaster, strangely passive in the face of the ruin
that surrounded them, as if stunned by despair and not yet awakened to
a realization of the horrors of the situation. Among these was the
possibility of famine. No city at any time carries more than a few days'
supply of provisions, and with the wholesale districts and warehouse
regions invaded by the flames the shortage of food made itself apparent
from the start. Water was even more difficult to obtain, the supply
being nearly all cut off. Those who possessed supplies of food and
liquids of any kind in many cases took advantage of the opportunity to
advance their prices. Thus an Associated Press man was obliged to pay
twenty-five cents for a small glass of mineral water, the only kind of
drink that at first was to be had, while food went up at the same rate,
bakers frequently charging as much as a dollar for a loaf. As for the
expressmen and cabmen, their charges were often practically prohibitory,
as much as fifty dollars being asked for the conveyance of a passenger
to the ferry. Policemen were early stationed at some of the retail
shops, regulating the sale and the price of food, and permitting only
a small portion to be sold to each purchaser, so as to prevent a few
persons from exhausting the supply.

The fire, the swaying and tottering walls, the frequent dynamite
explosions, each followed by a crashing shower of stones and bricks,
rendered the streets very unsafe for pedestrians, and all day long