Democratic Sentinel, Volume 12, Number 10, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 March 1888 — THE FOREIGN BUDGET. [ARTICLE]

THE FOREIGN BUDGET.

The earthquake shocks in Yunnan China, continued three weeks, destroying several towns and causing much damage to shipping. At Kien-Shiu 4,000 persons were killed. A gas explosion set tire to a crowded theater in Oporto, Portugal, while a play was in progress, and the building was consumed. Oporto dispatches furnish the following particulars of the awful calamity: While a performauc* was in progress at the Banquet Theater, Wednesday night, an explosion of gas occurred ana the theater took fire and was destroyed. The house was full of spectators at the time. Eighty bodies have been taken from the ruins. Most of those burned were in the third row of boxes and galleries, where whole families were suffocated. There was a terrible struggle at the door when the spectators tried to escape. Large numbers were suffocated and trampled upon. Many on reaching the street were so seriously injured that they vomited blood. Nearly all the victims were spectators. The actors escaped in theatrical costume. Many in the theater, finding themselves unable to reacn the doors, jumped from the windows. Some corpses were found in the stage boxes. A cable dispatch from Oporto, Portugal, says it is known that at leaet 126 people were burned to death in the theater lira The fire began by the blowing of an unprotected gas jet against the scenery. The sceneshifter saw the accident, and rushed to lower the curtain, but before he could do so the blazing scenes fell, on the stage, and the panic began. In the cheaper parts of the house the attendance was principally of the rougher class, including many sailors and dock porters, who crushed down the weaker people in their rush for the doors, using their fists, shoes and knives, and mercilessly slashing their way to the front. Girls, children and women were literally butchered by these panic-stricken brutes in their mad endeavor to get out. Many victims who escaped otherwise all right were desperately cut in the fight at the doorways. Some of those who were within jumped from high windows. Among these was the principal actress in the plav. A much shorter and safer way out existed, but many of the people on the stage either did not know of it or forgot it. A Berlin dispatch says the Emperor’s laryngeal disease is decidedly much less alarming thau it haj been for many months, and this gives rise to hopes that possibly he may be cured.